RECON 


AMERICAN  THOUGHT 

FROM  PURITANISM  TO 
PRAGMATISM 


BY 
WOODBRIDGE  RILEY,  Ph.D. 

PROFESSOR  OF  PHILOSOPHY  IN  VASSAR  COLLEQB 


NEW   YORK 

HENRY  HOLT  AND  CO:\n*ANY 

1915 


CopTRionT,  1915, 

BT 

HENRY  nOLT  AND  COMPANY 


THE   OUINN   «    BODEN    CO.    PRESS 


TO 

MY  FIRST  TEACHER  IN  PHILOSOPHY, 
GEORGE  TRUMBULL  LADD 


^ 


FOREWORD 

We,  as  a  country,  have  been  told  that  we  have  no 
philosophy,  that  we  do  but  reflect  the  speculations  of 
other  lands.  This  is  not  wholly  true.  We  have  had  phi- 
losophers, original  thinkers  who,  though  their  influence 
may  not  have  reached  abroad,  were  makers  of  history 
at  home.  So  a  study  of  the  speculative  movements  in 
America  leads  to  a  clearer  understanding  of  our  national 
character,  for  these  very  movements  are  so  closely  allied 
to  our  history  and  our  literature  that  they  may  be  said 
to  form  a  background  for  both. 

The  colonial  background  I  have  presented  in  a  pre- 
vious volume — American  Philosophy:  The  Early  Schools. 
This  described  the  most  important  forms  of  thought  as 
they  crossed  from  the  Old  to  the  New  World,  developed 
during  two  centuries,  and  slowly  prepared  the  way  for 
the  native  philosophy  of  Emerson.  The  present  work 
condenses  the  previous  account  and  continues  the  de- 
velopment of  national  thought  until  it  emerges  tri- 
umphantly in  pragmatism — a  typical  American  phi- 
losophy. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.    PUBITANISM 1 

1.  Philosophy   and  Politics,   from  Absolutism 

to   Democracy 1 

2.  The   New   England   Fathers    ....  6 

3.  The    Revolt    Against    Puritanism:     Ethan 

Allen 


II.   Early  Idealism 

1.  Samuel  Johnson,  Disciple  of  Berkeley 

2.  Jonathan    Edwards,   Mystic    . 

3.  Mysticism:   From  Quakerism  to  Christian 

Science 


III.  Deism 

1.  The  English    Influences    .... 

2.  The  Colonial  Colleges  and  Free-Thought 

3.  Philadelphia  and  Franklin     . 

4.  Virginia    and   Jefferson    .... 

5.  Thomas  Paine,  and  Popular  Deism 

IV.  Materialism  

1.  The  French  Influences      .... 

2.  Joseph   Priestley,  and  the  Homogeneity  of 

Man 

3.  Benjamin    Rush,   and   Mental   Healing 

V.   Realism 

1.  The  Scottish  Influences    . 

2.  The   Princeton    School 

3.  The  Lesser  Realists   .... 


VI.  Transcendentalism 

1.  Emerson,  Interpreter  of  Nature    . 

2.  The  Sources  of  Transcendentalism 

vu 


12 

19 
19 

28 

37 

54 
,54 

57 
68 
77 
8G 

96 
96 

100 
104 

118 
118 
123 
1.35 


140 
140 
154 


ii  CONTENTS 

PAQB 

cnAPTEn 

VII.   Evolutionism 172 

1.  The  Forerunners  of  Evolutionism  172 

2.  The  Antagonism  of  Agassiz        .  184 

3.  The  Reception  of  Darwinism  191 

4.  Cosmic   Philosophy:    John   Fiske       .        .  211 
6.    Genetic      Evolutionism:      James      Mark 

Baldwin 216 

VIII.   MoDEBN   Idealism 229 

1.  The  German   Influences        .        .        .        .229 

2.  The  St.  Louis  School:  William  T.  Harris  240 

3.  Romantic  Idealism:  Josiah  Royce     .        .  254 

4.  Idealism   and    Science:    George   Trumbull 

Ladd 265 

IX.   Peagmatism 279 

1.  Pragmatism:     The    Philosophy    of    Prac- 

ticality          279 

2.  Primitive  Pragmatism:   Charles  Peirce    .  284 

3.  The  Chicago  School:  John  Dewey     .        .  289 

4.  The   Cambridge    School:    William   James  308 

5.  The  Sources  of  Pragmatism                .        .  320 

6.  The   Critics  of  Pragmatism        .       .        .  331 

X.  Notes  on  the  New  Realism 341 

Select   Biblioqbaphy 361 

Index 369 


AMERICAN  THOUGHT 

CHAPTER  I 
PURITANISM 

1.   Philosophy    and   Politics,    from    Absolutism    to 
Democilvcy 

The  influence  of  philosophy  upon  politics  in  America 
is  easily  seen  in  the  evolution  of  such  a  familiar  phrase 
as  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness.  This 
declaration  of  independence  was  derived  indirectly,  by 
way  of  reaction,  from  a  declaration  of  dependence.  The 
belief  of  the  Puritans  was  a  belief  in  passivity,  determin- 
ism, and  pessimism.  They  considered  that  man  was  a 
mere  worm,  a  dull  instrument  in  the  hands  of  Deity; 
that  his  acts  were  predestined.  Deity  foreordaining 
whatsoever  comes  to  pass ;  that  his  life  was  a  vain  show, 
and  nature  a  vale  of  tears.  Over  against  these  lugu- 
brious doctrines  of  the  Puritans  we  may  put  those  of 
their  successors.  It  was  the  deists  who  believed  in 
activity,  freedom,  and  optimism.  They  held  that  man 
was  a  real  agent ;  that  he  was  free  to  do  what  he  chose ; 
that  his  goal  was  perfection  itself,  and  they  even  went 
so  far  as  to  say  that  whatever  is,  is  right.  These  beliefs 
slowly  spread  among  the  people  and  were  gradually  trans- 
lated into  the  plain  language  of  the  day.  Instead  of 
passivity  the  deists  believed  in  activity,— that  is,  life; 
instead  of  determinism  they  believed  in  freedom, — that 


2  ... .PURITANISM 

is,  .liberty ;' instead*  of  ^pessimism  they  believed  in  opti- 
,'iiUMh;^tliJ\tis;, -tlKJ  f>Mrsuit  of  happiness.  In  short,  be- 
tween the  Boston  Platform  of  1680  and  the  Declaration 
of  Independence  of  1776  a  marked  change  had  come 
about.  Tlic  deistic  sun  had  arisen,  dispelling  the  winter 
of  Puritan  discontent.  Humanity  was  considered  per- 
fectible and  this  world  the  best  of  all  possible  worlds. 

A  more  striking  instance  of  the  influence  of  philosophy 
upon  politics  is  seen  in  the  problem  of  political  sov- 
ereignty. Popular  government  in  this  country  was 
gained  only  after  a  long  struggle  in  which  philosophical 
tenets  played  a  large  part./  Developing  side  by  side,  the 
one  influencing  the  other,  the  philosophical  and  political 
movements  passed  through  the  same  changes.  In  the 
seventeenth  century  we  find  men's  interest  chiefly  cen- 
tered about  God.  In  the  eighteenth  century  that  interest 
is  twofold  Tit  concerns  itself  with  nature,  as  well  as  with 
God.  In  the  nineteenth  century  the  interest  has  trans- 
ferred itself  mainly  to  nature.  The  same  transfer  of 
thought  takes  place  in  politics.  In  the  seventeenth 
century-  the  interest  centers  in  the  king;  in  the  eight- 
eenth century  in  both  king  and  people;  in  the  nine- 
t_eenth  century  the  people  fill  the  foreground. 

We  may  go  back  and  express  this  great  movement  in 
terms  of  metaphysics,  and  say  that  the  conception  of 
the  absolute  in  America  is,  in  the  seventeenth  century, 
monistic ;  in  the  eighteenth  century,  dualistic ;  in  the 
nineteenth  century,  pantheistic.  Under  Puritanism 
there  is  a  belief  in  one,  supreme,  self-sufficient  being, 
the  sole  ruler  and  disposer  of  all  things.  Under  deism 
there  is  a  belief  in  a  deity  whose  powers  and  functions 
are  limited  by  a  law  outside  himself, — the  law  of  nature, 
inviolable  and  immutable.  Under  transcendentalism, 
the  deity,  becoming  immanent,  is  submerged  in  nature, 


PHILOSOPHY  AND  POLITICS  3 

can   scarcely   be   distinguished    from   the   cosmic   proc- 
esses. 

We  have  here  three  philosophical  conceptions.  It  is 
not  hard  to  show  that  they  were  influenced  in  their 
growth  by  the  current  theories  of  government.  At  the 
time  of  Puritanism  there  is  a  belief  in  absoluie_monarchy, 
when  sovereignty  is  conceived  to  be  given  by  Gq^  ^o  _ 
the  king,  who  thus  rules  by  divine  right.  Then,  at 
the  time  of  deism  there  is  a  belief  in  limited  monarchy, 
when  sovereignty  is  conceived  to  be  shared  between 
ruler  and  subject,  under  a  dual  control.  Finally,  along 
with  transcendentalism  there  arises  a  true  conception 
of  representative  democracy,  when  sovereignty  is  con- 
ceived as  vested  in  the  people  through  the  inalienable 
right  of  the  law  of  nature.  Between  these  two  move- 
ments there  is  a  striking  parallel.  In  philosophy,  the 
predominant  interests  are  first:  deity;  then  deity  and 
nature ;  and  lastly  nature.  In  polities  the  kindred  in- 
terests are:  king,  then  king  and  people,  and  finally  the 
people  alone.  That  these  sets  of  conceptions  are  really 
kindred  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  one  may  be  expressed 
in  terms  of  tlie  other.  Under  Puritanism  the  deity  is  V^ 
represented  as  a  dread  monarch  and  sovereign  ruler. 
This  is  the  Calvinistic  description  of  the  immortal  GQd._ 
The  same  terms  are  used  in  reference  to  the  temporal^ 
king.  In  the  Articles  of  the  Plymouth  Church  occurs 
the  phrase:  "  The  King's  majesty  we  aeknoxyledge  for" 
supreme  governour,"  while  the  subscribers  to  the  Ma^- 
/foii'er  compact  sign  themselves  "  loyal  subjects  of  our 
dread  sovereign  Lord  King  James." 

These^two  conceptions  sound  so  much  alike  because 
they  are  derived  from  common  principles.    Both  English 
monarchy  and  New  England  theocracy  are  based  upon""" 
the  underlying  tenet  of  transcendence  and  determinism. 


4  PURITANISM 

In  ivligion  this  meant,  briefly,  that  God  was  far  off 
from  his  world  and  that  he  foreordained  all  its  events. 
In  politics,  as  Tom  Paine  bluntly  expresses  it  in  his 
Common,  k'^cnsc,  this  meant  that  the  state  of  a  king  shuts 
him  off  from  the  world,  yet  the  business  of  a  king  re- 
quires him  to  know  it  thoroughly.  To  carry  out  the 
parallel.  The  state  advocates  of  divine  right  made  the 
king  high  above  his  people  and,  at  the  same  time,  an  auto- 
crat who  decided  the  smallest  affairs  in  the  utmost  bounds 
of  his  kingdom.  The  church  advocates  of  divine  sover- 
eignty were  of  the  same  temper  and  held  that  the  Most 
High  doth  direct,  dispose,  and  govern  all  creatures, 
actions,  and  things  from  the  greatest  even  to  the  least. 

Here  are  two  sets  of  belief  similar  in  sense  and  leading 
to  similar  results.  Yet  neither  king  nor  Calvin  was  to 
reign  forever.  A  reaction  followed  which,  in  the  case 
of  the  state,  led  to  political  revolt,  and  in  the  affairs 
of  the  church  to  a  philosophical  revolt.  The  former  is 
a  commonplace  of  history,  the  latter  has  not  been  made 
sufficiently  prominent.  The  Puritan  divinity  was  too 
much  like  the  Stuart  dynasty  to  be  long  acceptable 
to  Anglo-American  Independents.  Special  providences 
exerted  in  behalf  of  the  elect  bore  too  striking  a  resem- 
blance to  his  Majesty's  partiality  to  a  favored  few. 
And  then,  too,  the  doctrine  of  the  sovereignty  of  God — 
absolute  and  unchallenged  in  will,  power,  and  decree — led 
to  the  political  equivalents  coming  under  fire.  Thus  it 
was  that  William  Livingston  treated  of  the  political 
correlatives  and  wrote  picturesquely  on  "  Passive  Obe- 
dience and  Non-Resistance  ":  "  The  tyrant  used  to  club 
with  the  clergy  and  set  them  a-roaring  for  the  divine 
rights  of  royal  roguery.  'Twas  a  damnable  sin  to  resist 
the  cutting  of  throats  and  no  virtue  more  Christian  and 
refulgent  than  of  a  passive  submission  to  butchery  and 


PHILOSOPHY  AND  POLITICS  5 

slaughter.  To  propagate  such  fustian  in  America  argues 
a  disposition  prone  to  senility.  And  yet  'tis  not  above 
four  years  ago,  that  in  this  very  province  I  heard  a 
dapper  young  gentleman,  attired  in  his  canonicals,  con- 
tend as  strenuously  for  non-resistance  as  if  he  had  been 
animated  with  the  very  soul  of  Sacheverell. " 

Writing  such  as  this  marks  the  change  from  the  Cal- 
vinistic  or  Puritan  to  the  deistic  or  rational  point  of 
view.  "What  has  been  said  of  this  change  in  England 
holds  true  of  the  colonies.  The  theological  conception 
of  politics  gave  way  before  what  may  be  termed  the 
naturalistic.  Instead  of  the  constructive  theory  of  the 
divine  rights  there  was  a  transition  to  the  theory  of 
natural  rights  vested  not  only  in  the  king  but  in  the 
people.  The  latter,  as  propounded  by  Locke,  was  merely 
the  former  in  disguise,  for  the  doctrine  oF^ivine  rights 
not  only  was  transformed  by  imperceptible  degrees  into 
the  theory  of  natural  rights,  but  left  behind  it  a  legacy, 
in  the  sense  that,  because  it  is  natural,  government  in 
general  is  divine. 

This  process  was  destined  to  be  carried  further. 
LTnder  the  constant  appeals  to  an  absolute  law  and 
absolute  right,  there  was  a  tendency  to  substitute  lex 
for  legislator,  the  principle  for  the  person,  and  thus  to 
run  from  the  dualistic  to  the  pantheistic  stage.  Conse- 
quently, that  law  of  nature  which  under  Puritanism  was 
a  subordinate  source  of  authority,  and  under  deism  a 
co-ordinate,  under  transcendentalism  became  in  itself 
an  ultimate  source"6f  authority — a  veritable  absolute. 
Or,  put  in  terms  of  political  history:  That  sovereignty 
which  first  appertained  to  the  king  by  divine  right, 
and  was  then  shared  by  the  people  by  natural  right,  was 
at  last  lodged  inalienably  in  the  democracy.  "With  this 
supersession  of  the  vox  dei  by  the  vox  populi,  there 


6  PURITANISM 

resulted  a  curious  analogy  between  the  pantheism  of 
Emerson  and  the  doctrine  of  popular  sovereignty.  With 
the  belief  that  the  universe  governs  itself,  is  sufficient 
to  itself  and  is  itself  its  own  end,  came  the  declaration 
that  the  federal  government  is  a  government  of  the 
people,  by  the  people,  and  for  the  people, 

2.   The  New  England  Fathers 

Puritanism  in  America  enjoyed  a  metaphysical  mo- 
nopoly for  almost  two  centuries.  JFrom  the  landing  of 
the  Pilgrims  to  the  appearance  of  Emerson  the  prevalent 
faith  of  the  colonists  and  their  descendants  was  Cal- 
vinism. This  faith  has  been  summed  up  in  five  points; 
it  can  be  even  more  briefly  put  under  two.  These  are 
transcendence  and  determinism,  or  the  conception  of  a 
deity  who  lives  apart  from  the  world,  and  still  guides 
and  governs  that  world  in  the  smallest  details.  This 
/  belief  in  "  one  supreme  self-sufficient  Being,  sole  ruler 
and  disposer  of  all  "  obtained  along  the  Atlantic  coast 
for  even  more  miles  than  it  did  years.  It  was  adhered 
to  by  the  Puritans  in  Massachusetts  and  Connecticut, 
by  the  Dutch  Reformed  in  New  York  and  New  Jersey, 
by  the  orthodox  German  sects  in  Pennsylvania,  and  in 
the  South,  on  the  seaboard  by  the  Huguenots,  and  in 
the  mountains  by  the  Scotch-Irish  Presbyterians,  the 
so-called  Puritans  of  the  South. 

Thus  wide  was  the  influence  of  Calvinism  both  as  to 
duration  of  time  and  extent  of  space,  for  even  the 
Church  of  England  in  America  contained  a  large  in- 
filtration of  Genevan  doctrine. 

With  such  a  monopoly  it  is  not  surprising  that  Puri- 
tanism has  been  violently  attacked,  and  that  its  history. 
has  suffered  at  the  hands  of  the  expositor  who  delights 


THE  NEW  ENGLAND  FATHERS        7 

in  presenting  its  sulphurous  side.  Thus  a  New  England 
poem  like  the  ' '  Day  of  Doom  ' '  is  taken  as  a  fair  example 
of  the  distressing  illusions  once  inflicted  upon  them-_ 
selves  in  the  name  of  religion  by  the  best  of  men,  and 
lis  "author "^is  declared  to  have  attributed  to  the  Divine 
Being  the  most  execrable  and  loathsome  character  to 
be  met  with  in  any  literature,  Christian  or  pagan.  This 
is  said  to  be  his  narrow  and  ferocious  creed :  All  men  are 
totally  depraved,  all  of  them  caught  from  the  farthest 
eternity  in  the  adamantine  meshes  of  God's  decrees; 
the  most  of  them  also  being  doomed  in  advance  by  those 
decrees  to  an  endless  existence  of  ineffable  torment, 
and  the  whole  world,  when  the  Judge  of  all  the  earth 
appears,  to  an  universal  conflagration. 

In  this  sketch  too  black  a  pencil  has  been  used.  If 
there  is  a  dark  side  of  Puritanism  there  is  also  a  bright 
one.  Later  we  shall  examine  the  mystical  portrait  of 
Jonathan  Edwards  with  its  sweetness  and  light.  But 
now  we  may  look  at  Calvinism  as  if  it  were  a  larger 
canvas  painted  in  the  grand  manner.  As  such  it  in- 
eluded  the  belief  in  the  divine  Sovereignty  which  left 
meETfree  from  care.  To  the  elect  no  final  ill  could  fall 
because  they  were  eared  for  by  a  Spirit,  "  infinite, 
eternal,  and  unchangeable."  Theirs  was  a  sublime  trusty 
and  theirs  a  sublime  fatalism.  But  this  was  earried_to 
extremes.  As  the  historian  of  colonial  literature  has 
described  it:  the  belief  in  a  present,  watchful,  and 
benign  Providence  turned  to  abject  superstition, — the 
belief  in  a  microscopic  and  picayune  providence  con- 
cerning every  falling  tower,  capsized  sail-boat,  or  lost 
cow.  It  is  almost  incredible  that  the  sublime  and  the 
ridiculous  could  be  drawn  from  the  same  source.  But 
such  is  the  fact.  The  tone  of  Puritanism  is  a  matter 
of  interpretation.     At  the  first  there  was  about  it  the~^ 


8  PURITANISM 

lingering  luster  of  the  Elizabethan  age;  at  the  last  it 
became  mean  and  petty  in  the  narrow  routine  of  provin- 
cial life. 

We  turn  now  to  the  American  system  of  high  Calvin- 
ism as  it  was  expressed  in  official  standards,  like  the 
Boston  Platform  of  1680,  and  in  the  utterances  of  its 
expositors  from  the  Mathers  to  Jonathan  Edwards. 
Calvinism  as  a  system  stands  four-square.  It  may  be 
viewed  from  the  philosophic  standpoints  of  ontology, 
the  theory  of  being;  of  cosmology,  the  theory  of  the 
world ;  of  epistemology,  the  theory  of  knowledge ;  and 
finally  of  psychology,  the  theory  of  personality.  First,  as 
a  theory  of  being,  Calvinism  teaches  that  the  deity  lives 
outside  the  framework  of  the  universe ;  that  he  interferes 
as  he  sees  fit  according  to  an  absolute  and  arbitrary 
will ;  that  he  works  through  inscrutable  decrees ;  that  he 
foreordains  whatever  comes  to  pass.  Second,  as  a  theory 
of  the  cosmos,  Calvinism  teaches  that  the  world  is  under 
the  curse  of  the  divine  displeasure;  that  it  conceals 
rather  than  displays  its  creator;  that  it  is  created  from 
nothing  and  is  destined  to  return  to  nothing;  that  the 
evil  in  it  is  a  permissive  act  of  God.  Third,  as  a  theory 
of  knowing,  Calvinism  teaches  that  true  knowledge  comes 
more  through  revelation  than  through  reason,  being  a 
gift  of  the  divine  pleasure  rather  than  a  result  of  human 
endeavor;  that  the  decretive  will  of  God  is  involved  in 
deep  mystery,  which  is  for  us  little  better  than  learned 
ignorance;  that  man  has  only  a  dim  revelation  of  a 
hidden  God  communicated  from  without;  that  the 
human  mind  has  no  natural  capacity  for  understanding 
the  divine  nature.  Fourth,  as  a  theory  of  personality, 
Calvinism  teaches  that  God  is  alien  in  essence  from 
man;  that  human  progress  comes  through  arbitrary 
grace,  man  being  by  nature  corrupt ;  that  our  liberty  is 


THE  NEW  ENGLAND  FATHERS        9 

not  self-determined,  but  works  only  within  the  limita- 
tions of  our  foreordained  nature;  that  the  last  dictate 
_of_tlie  understanding  determines  the  will, — and  yet,  that 
within  the  will  are  included  the  inclinations. 

Such,  in  brief  compass,  was  the  system  of  official 
Calvinism.  In  its  extreme  form  it  obtained  chiefly  in 
Now  England,  for  like  an  Arctic  current  of  thought, 
it  grew  slowly  warmer  and  was  gradually  dissipated 
as  it  flowed  south  into  the  more  genial  regions  of 
Anglican  belief.  We  have  now  to  consider  some  of 
the  general  causes  which,  in  the  course  of  time,  have 
modified  this  frigid  system.  The  first  rival  of  Calvin- 
ism was  Arminianism,  which  has  been  defined  as  an 
appeal  to  consciousness  against  a  system  of  abstract 
logic.  Calvinism  had  emphasized  the  God-ward  side 
of  theology  and  turned  the  divine  government  into  an 
inexorable  fate.  Arminianism,  on  the  contrary,  em- 
phasized the  man-ward  side  of  theology  and  regarded 
human  activity  as  a  necessary  condition  of  moral  re- 
sponsibility. This  contrast  was  rather  in  the  way  of 
professional  theological  rivalry;  it  remained  for  ordi- 
nary human  nature  to  exhibit  the  full  psychological 
revulsion :  the  head  might  believe  in  determinism  and 
depravity,  but  the  heart  revolted  against  such  dreadful 
doctrines. 

The  second  rival  of  Calvinism  was  deism, — the  com- 
ing system  of  free-thought.  This  questioned  the  arbi- 
trary fiat  of  the  Creator,  and  succeeded  in  bringing  back 
liberty  of  human  action.  Between  an  absolute  creator 
and  an  abject  creation  there  was  brought  in  a  third 
factor,  the  law  of  nature  in  whose  benefits  man  par- 
ticipated. However,  in  emphasizing  the  importance  of 
that  law,  in  making  its  bounds  more  and  more  exten- 
sive, deism  tended  to  push  the  creator  entirely  away 


10  PURITANISM 

from  his  world.  Hence  by  the  time  the  law  of  nature 
was  madt'  universal,  the  deity  was  brought  to  a  far 
remove,  and  while  counted  the  maker,  was  no  longer 
considered  the  ruler  of  the  universe.  Here  was  the 
abseutee  landlord  theory  carried  to  extreme;  for  with 
this  banishment  of  the  master  the  servant  grew  boldly 
arrogant,  Man,  looking  within  himself,  was  becoming 
a  law  unto  himself;  hence  that  air  of  moral  conceit  and 
self-sufficiency  assumed  in  increasing  measure  towards 
the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century. 

We  have  anticipated  and  must  therefore  go  back  and 
study  the  more  exact  processes  that  brought  about  the 
disintegration  of  Calvinism.  'First,  there  was  a  gradual 
degradation  or  lowering  of  the  doctrine  of  transcen- 
dence, through  the  belief  in  miraculous  intervention ;  here 
the  deity  is  brought  into  the  world,  not  by  immanence, 
but  by  interference,  and  general  providence  is  turned 
into  special  providences.  In  place  of  the  noble  defini- 
tion of  **  the  living  and  true  God,  infinite  in  being  and 
perfection,  a  most  pure  spirit,  immutable,  immense, 
eternal,  incomprehensible,"  there  comes  a  conception  of 
a  being  who  manifests  himself  in  "  remarkable  sea- 
deliverances,  remarkables  about  thunder  and  lightning, 
remarkable  judgments  upon  Quakers,  drunkards,  and 
enemies  of  the  church."  There  followed  also  a  gradual 
integration  or  hardening  of  the  doctrine  of  determin- 
ism ;  the  freedom  of  the  will  which  was  verbally  allowed 
in  the  Westminster  standards  being  practically  denied 
by  the  later  consistent  Calvinists.  Instead  of  the  pro- 
vision w'hereby  "  no  violence  is  offered  unto  the  will  of 
the  creature,  nor  is  the  liberty  or  contingency  of  second 
causes  taken  away,"  there  comes  Samuel  Willard's 
avowal  that  there  is  in  man  a  *'  miserable  impotency 
and  malignity  of  will  with  respect  to  holy  choices." 


THE  NEW  ENGLAND  FATHERS       11 

Nevertheless  there  was  a  gradual  elimination  or  soften- 
ing of  the  doctrine  of  the  necessary  depravity  of  human 
nature;  here  the  new  world  being  perforce  a  better 
world  than  the  corrupt  society  Calvin  had  in  view,  men 
began  somewhat  egotistically  to  plume  themselves  on 
their  virtues.  Thus,  in  place  of  the  ancient  saying  that 
"  all  noisome  lusts  abound  in  the  soul  like  snakes  in  an 
old  hedge,"  we  find  Cotton  Mather  rejoicing  that  the 
Puritan  by  flying  from  the  depravity  of  Europe  to  the 
American  strand  doth  improve  his  manners.  Finally, 
there  came  a  more  lenient  conception  of  the  character 
of  the  Absolute.  There  was  no  longer  a  sovereign  will 
at  an  immeasurable  distance  from  man,  but  a  more 
kindly  leader,  commander,  and  ruler  of  nature.  In 
place  of  the  outpourings  of  the  divine  fury,  there  comes 
the  infiltration  of  the  quality  of  mercy  due  to  the  essen- 
tial benevolence  of  the  deity. 

In  tracing  the  processes  at  work  in  the  amelioration 
of  Calvinism  we  notice  that  the  positive  factors  were 
more  powerful  than  the  negative,  the  best  minds  pre- 
ferring the  progressive  to  the  reactionary  tenets.  The 
process  of  elevation,  in  short,  was  stronger  than  degra- 
dation. It  therefore  came  about  that  Calvinism  found 
itself  insensibly  drifting  into  the  deistic  current, — away 
from  the  pessimistic  towards  the  optimistic,  away  from 
the  misanthropic  towards  the  philanthropic.  How  strong 
that  current  was  may  be  seen  fully  only  after  we  have 
explored  the  contributing  streams.  These  were  three: 
The  political,  which  reached  from  a  state-supported 
church  to  perfect  liberty  of  philosophizing;  the  natu- 
ralistic, which  reached  from  the  supernatural  to  the 
scientific;  the  rationalistic,  which  reached  from  revela- 
tion to  reason.  These  three  streams  or  tendencies  were 
represented  by  three  men :  the  political  by  Thomas  Jef- 


12  PURITANISM 

ferson;  the  scientific  by  Benjamin  Franklin;  the  ra- 
tionalistic by  Ethan  Allen. 

3.   The  Revolt  Against  Puritanism  :  Ethan  Allen 

Ethan  Allen  of  Vermont  has  been  previously  known 
for  his  military  exploits,  but  quite  ignored  for  his 
speculative  ventures.  In  the  preface  to  his  Oracles  of 
Reason,  1784,  the  captor  of  Ticonderoga  confesses  that 
he  has  been  denominated  a  deist ;  whether  he  is  he  does 
not  know,  but  this  he  does  know,  that  he  is  no  Calvin- 
ist.  In  a  pungent  letter  to  one  who  inquired  concern- 
ing his  philosophy,  he  writes  that  he  expects  that  the 
clergy,  and  their  devotees,  will  proclaim  war  upon  him 
in  the  name  of  the  Lord,  having  put  on  the  armor  of 
faith,  the  sword  of  the  Spirit,  and  the  artillery  of  hell 
fire.  "  But,"  he  concludes,  "I  am  a  hardy  Moun- 
taineer and  have  been  accustomed  to  the  ravages  and 
horrors  of  War  and  Captivity,  nnd  scorn  to  be  intimi- 
dated by  threats;  if  they  fright  me  they  must  abso- 
lutely produce  some  of  their  tremendous  fire,  and  give 
me  a  sensative  scorching." 

For  Allen's  roughness  of  manners  and  coarseness  of 
speech  Jared  Sparks  gives  as  mitigating  circumstances 
the  rude  and  uncultivated  society  in  which  the  author 
lived.  It  might  be  added  that  the  "  Green  Mountain 
Boy  "  was  one  of  those  backwoods  thinkers  who  claim 
to  be  largely  independent  of  outside  ideas.  Some  rival 
asserted  that  he  stole  his  title  from  Blount's  Oracles  of 
Reason,  but  the  author  of  this  "  Compenduous  System 
of  Natural  Religion  "  throws  no  direct  light  on  its 
sources.  He  maintained  that  the  Bible  and  the  diction- 
ary were  his  only  authorities,  but  while  he  might  have 
made  a  better  use  of  both,  it  is  hard  to  learn  of  what 


THE  REVOLT  AGAINST  PURITANISM  13 

other  means  of  information  he  availed  himself.  He 
tells  how  in  his  youth,  being  educated  in  what  were 
commonly  called  "  Armenian  "  principles,  he  was  much 
disposed  to  contemplation,  and  at  his  commencement 
in  manhood,  being  in  the  habit  of  committing  to  manu- 
script such  sentiments  or  arguments  as  appeared  most 
consonant  to  reason,  he  practiced  this  method  of  scrib- 
bling for  many  years.  So  claiming  to  have  something 
of  a  smattering  of  philosophy,  he  recounts  that  while  in 
an  English  prison-ship  in  1775  and  meeting  two  clergy- 
men,— "  We  discoursed  on  several  parts  of  moral  phi- 
losophy and  Christianity,  and  they  seemed  to  be  sur- 
prised that  I  should  be  acquainted  with  such  topics,  or 
that  I  should  understand  a  syllogism  or  regular  mode 
of  argumentation." 

Whatever  the  impulses  that  affected  Ethan  Allen, 
whatever  the  value  of  his  claims  as  a  self-made  thinker, 
his  work  furnishes  a  good  example  of  the  popular  recoil 
from  Puritanism  on  the  part  of  one  who  wished  to  pur- 
sue the  "  natural  road  of  ratiocination."  This  negative 
side  of  the  Oracles  is  couched  in  a  lively  and  aggressive 
style,  for  the  writer  is  appealing  to  readers  who  despise 
the  wearisome  reasonings  of  philosophers  and  are  pre- 
possessed with  principles  opposed  to  the  religion  of 
reason.  In  these  parts  of  America,  he  explains,  men  are 
most  generally  taught  that  they  are  born  into  the  world 
in  a  state  of  enmity  to  God  and  moral  good  and  are 
under  his  wrath  and  curse ;  that  the  way  to  heaven  and 
future  blessedness  is  out  of  their  power  to  pursue,  and 
that  it  is  encumbered  with  mysteries  which  none  but  the 
priests  can  unfold ;  that  we  must  "  be  born  again,"  have 
a  special  kind  of  faith,  and  be  regenerated. 

Upon  the  priests  and  their  so-called  scheme  of  mys- 
teries, Allen  now  proceeds  to  make  his  onslaught.    This 


14  PURITANISM 

is  the  substance  of  his  tirade:  the  spiritualists,  who 
pretend  to  be  as  familiar  with  the  supernatural  world 
as  witli  their  own  home-lot,  talk  as  if  the  creator  and 
governor  of  the  universe  had  erected  a  particular  acad- 
emy of  arts  and  sciences  in  which  they,  the  tutors,  were 
alone  intellectually  qualified  to  carry  on  the  business  of 
teaching.  With  their  special  revelations  they  talk  as 
if  they  only  were  rational  creatures,  and  the  rest  of 
mankind  a  pack  of  clodhoppers,  as  ignorant  as  a  stable 
of  horses ;  but  that  is  no  revelation  to  me  which  is  above 
my  comprehension,  or  which  from  any  natural  sagacity 
I  knew  before.  They  may  keep  their  alleged  manuscript 
copy  of  God's  eternal  law,  it  is  sufficient  for  me  to 
possess  the  deistical  Bible,  reason,  by  which  I  judge 
that  even  the  commandments  of  the  Decalogue  would  not 
be  binding  upon  any  rational  being  unless  they  coincided 
with  the  law  of  nature. 

Allen  next  proceeds  to  attack  the  Calvinistical  system 
with  all  the  homely  wit  of  which  he  is  master.  Against 
the  cardinal  belief  in  magical  interferences  in  the  course 
of  nature  he  argues  that  such  intervention  would  turn 
nature  into  a  supernatural  whirligig,  an  inconstant  and 
erring  piece  of  mechanism;  would  reduce  all  nature  to 
the  level  of  fanaticism ;  would  lead  men  to  abandon  the 
great  discoveries  of  Newton  for  awful  apprehensions 
of  God's  providence,  whereby  world  would  crash  upon 
world,  or  the  tail  of  the  next  comet  would  set  this  world 
on  fire.  But  such  apprehensions  are  unwarranted  and 
lead  to  a  logical  fallacy;  either  the  great  architect  of 
nature  has  so  constructed  its  machinery  that  it  never 
needs  to  be  altered,  or,  admitting  miracles,  we  must 
admit  this  syllogism :  the  laws  of  nature  have  been  al- 
tered, the  alteration  has  been  for  the  better,  therefore, 
the  eternal  establishment  thereof  was   imperfect.     In 


THE  REVOLT  AGAINST  PURITANISM  15 

fine,  to  demonstrate  such  a  scarecrow  belief,  one  need 
but  quote  the  anecdote  attributed  to  his  Most  Christian 
Majesty,  the  King  of  France:  "  By  command  of  the 
King,  God  is  forbidden  to  work  any  more  miracles  in 
this  place." 

These  are  fair  examples  of  Allen's  anti-Calvinistic 
bias.  Against  other  connected  doctrines  of  the  old 
systems  he  argues  in  a  like  short  and  easy  manner, 
asserting,  for  example,  that  original  sin  had  as  little  to 
do  with  the  premised  Adam  as  with  the  man  in  the 
moon;  that  the  doctrine  of  imputation,  or  the  transfer 
of  the  personal  demerit  of  sin,  is  contradicted  by  the 
old  proverb  that  every  tub  stands  upon  its  own  bottom ; 
and  that  instead  of  insisting  upon  the  gloomy  doctrine 
of  predestination,  the  teachers  of  this  doctrine  should 
spend  their  salaries  in  good  wine  to  make  the  heart 
glad. 

With  this  vigorous  but  coarse  attack  upon  the  five 
points  of  Calvinism,  there  is  little  wonder  that  Allen's 
miscalled  theology  should  have  been  cordially  detested 
by  the  orthodox,  and  that  it  should  have  been  con- 
sidered an  evidence  of  the  workings  of  a  watchful  provi- 
dence that  most  of  the  edition  was  accidentally  burned. 
Nevertheless  the  Vermont  free-thinker  had  something 
else  to  do  but  startle  the  natives  with  his  rustic  wit. 
Besides  the  negative  part  of  his  work,  in  which  he 
attempted  to  lop  off  the  excrescences,  there  was  the 
positive,  in  which  he  feels  confident  that  he  has  struck 
the  outlines  of  a  consistent  system.  Briefly,  in  the 
place  of  the  conception  of  a  transcendent  being,  occa- 
sionally active  in  the  affairs  of  the  world,  quite  incom- 
prehensible within  the  mere  limits  of  reason,  he  would 
substitute  the  conception  of  an  immanent  power,  con- 
tinually active  in  the  world,  knowable  in  his  nature  from 


16  PURITANISM 

a  man's  own  rational  nature.  Here,  as  the  matter  has 
been  previously  summarized,  the  origin  of  the  concep- 
tion of  a  superintending  power  is  traced  to  the  sense 
of  dependence  on  the  laws  of  nature;  from  studies  of 
those  laws  reason  discovers  the  perfections  of  that 
power;  order  implies  an  orderer,  harmony  a  regulator, 
motion  a  mover,  and  benefits  goodness;  chaos  would 
prove  a  creator,  but  order  and  beneficent  design  are 
necessary  to  prove  providence. 

Allen  has  now  taken  the  first  forward  step  in  his 
system,  and  that  step  is  optimism.  As  he  expressed  the 
matter  in  a  line  obviously  drawn  from  the  Essay  on 
Man:  of  all  possible  systems,  infinite  wisdom  must  have 
eternally  discerned  the  best.  This,  it  is  explained,  im- 
plies the  essential  benevolence  of  the  deity  and  thereby 
we  discover  the  prime  requisite  of  moral  perfection. 
But  great  difficulties  arise  in  attempting  to  discover 
God's  natural  attributes,  especially  his  eternity  and 
infinity:  Because  of  these  difficulties  the  writer  is  now 
forced  to  postulate  two  absolutes:  God,  the  efficient 
cause,  eternal  and  infinite,  and  nature  the  eternal  and 
infinite  effect;  eternal  here  being  defined  as  without 
end  or  duration,  infinite  as  without  degree  or  measure ; 
hence,  on  the  one  side,  is  a  cause  uncaused  and  eternally 
self-existent  who  gave  being  and  order  to  nature  coeval 
with  his  own  existence;  on  the  other  is  nature  coex- 
tensive and  coexistent  with  the  divine  nature,  eternal 
because  of  an  eternal  and  immense  fullness,  infinite 
because  infinitely  complete  and  independent  of  any 
particular  form. 

With  two  absolutes  on  his  hands  Allen  is  now  in 
dire  trouble.  He  sees  the  break  between  creator  and 
creation  and  tries  to  mend  it  by  expanding  his  previous 
notions  of  nature  as  being  in  a  constant  state  of  flux. 


THE  REVOLT  AGAINST  PURITANISM  17 

He  explains  that  all  forms  are  indebted  to  creation  for 
their  existence.  The  dissolution  of  forms  animate  or 
inanimate  neither  adds  to  nor  diminishes  from  crea- 
tion; reduced  to  their  original  elements  they  are 
changed  into  new  and  diverse  forms  in  never-ceasing 
rounds.  The  particles  of  matter  vi^hich  compose  my 
body  may  have  existed  in  more  millions  of  different 
forms  than  I  am  able  to  enumerate,  and  be  still  liable 
to  fluctuations  equally  numerous.  This  elementary 
fluxility  of  matter,  which  is  mere  creation,  is  as  eternal 
as  God,  yet  the  particular  productions,  arising  from 
natural  causes,  have  a  beginning  and  an  end. 

"With  this  reference  to  the  ancient  doctrine  of  nature 
as  a  plastic  principle  one  may  leave  the  Oracles  of 
Reason.  This  work  the  elder  President  D wight  of  Yale 
called  the  first  formal  publication  in  the  United  States 
openly  directed  against  the  Christian  religion ;  Presi- 
dent Jared  Sparks  of  Harvard  described  it  as  a  crude 
and  worthless  performance,  in  which  truth  and  error, 
reason  and  sophistry,  knowledge  and  ignorance,  in- 
genuity and  presumption  are  mingled  together  in  a 
chaos  which  the  author  denominates  a  system.  These 
academic  strictures  were  perhaps  deserved  from  the 
standpoint  of  the  orthodox,  yet  the  author  received 
some  praise,  for  as  his  friend  George  Washington  said: 
"  There  is  an  original  something  about  Allen  that  com- 
mands attention." 

The  "  original  something"  which  Allen  contributed 
was  this:  a  clear  recognition  of  tlie  difficulties  of 
dualism,  the  old  theological  separation  between  God 
and  the  world.  Allen  suggested  but  did  not  effect  a 
compromise.  He  spoke  of  the  immense  creation  that 
we  denominate  by  the  name  nature,  and  of  its  being 
necessarily  coextensive  and  coexistent  with  the  divine 


18  PURITANISM 

iijifiirc.  l'>ut  how  to  identify  creator  and  creation,  how 
to  make  the  two  one,  that  final  step  he  never  took. 
Nevertheless,  in  this  very  failure  to  identify  the  two 
conceptions,  to  make  creator  and  creation  the  same  One 
and  All,  permanent  and  infinite,  the  Vermont  philoso- 
pher did  but  leave  a  speculative  task  to  be  undertaken 
by  a  greater  mind  in  a  neighboring  State,  for  it  was 
Emerson  who,  struggling  with  the  apparent  dualism 
between  God  and  nature,  had  the  boldness  to  announce 
that  the  Absolute  is  one  with  the  ordering  and  creative 
power  of  the  universe. 


CHAPTER  II 
EARLY  IDEALISM 

1.   Samuel  Johnson  :  Disciple  op  Berkeley 

In  Samuel  Johnson  of  Connecticut  wc  meet  a  colonial 
idealist  of  an  unusual  type,  not  a  mystic  and  recluse, 
but  a  publicist  and  traveler.  After  graduation  at  Yale  Col- 
ege,  Johnson  voyaged  across  the  Atlantic,  met  such  nota- 
bles as  Alexander  Pope  and  the  English  Samuel  John- 
son, and  visited  Oxford  and  Cambridge  Universities,  from 
which  in  due  course  he  was  to  receive  honorary  degrees. 

Returning  to  the  narrow  bigotry  of  the  British 
provinces,  Johnson  was  not  able  to  renew  his  larger 
interests  until  the  visit  of  the  Reverend  George  Berke- 
ley, the  Irish  idealist,  who  in  1729  took  up  his  residence 
in  Newport,  Rhode  Island.  It  was  there  that  Johnson 
became  a  convert  to  the  "  New  Principle,"  against 
which  he  had  been  warned  in  college,  but  which  now 
seemed  to  him  more  apt  than  any  other  to  be  the  true 
philosophical  support  of  faith,  to  harmonize  with  our 
individual  dependence  on  the  Supreme  Mind  or  Will, 
perpetually  present  and  perpetually  active.  IMoreover, 
the  new  system  offered  a  satisfactory  substitute  for  cer- 
tain old  notions  of  matter.  In  place  of  the  scholastic 
notion  of  an  occult  substance,  and  of  the  Cartesian 
notion  of  a  dead,  inert  somewhat,  Berkeley  substituted 
spiritual  causality.  In  place  of  a  phantom  world  lying 
behind  the  visible  and  tangible  universe,  and  in  place  of 
masses  of  matter  moved  by  mechanical  forces  he  would 

19 


20  EARLY  IDEALISM 

put  as  "  proper,  active,  efficient  causes  none  but  Spirit; 
nor  any  action,  strictly  speaking,  but  where  there  is 
Will." 

Such  is  Berkeley's  explanation  of  the  universal  im- 
materialism  in  reply  to  a  question  of  his  ardent 
American  disciple.  The  latter 's  first  letter  contained 
some  doubts  as  to  the  propriety  of  denying  the  absolute 
existence  of  matter,  though  he  strove  to  understand  how 
that  meant  nothing  more  than  a  denial  of  an  incon- 
ceivable substratum  of  sensible  phenomena.  From 
Johnson's  letter  of  inquiry,  which  lay  unpublished  for 
over  a  century  and  three-quarters,  we  may  now  give 
these  extracts: 

Rev.d  Sr. 

The  Kind  Invitation  you  gave  me  in  Reading  those  ex- 
cellent Books  which  you  was  pleased  to  order  into  my  Hands, 
is  all  the  Apology  I  shall  offer  for  the  Trouble  I  now  presume 
to  give  you :  But  nothing  could  encourage  me  to  expose  to 
your  views  my  low  and  mean  way  of  Thinking  &  wi-iting,  but 
my  hopes  of  an  Interest  in  that  Candor  and  Tenderness  which 
are  so  conspicuous  both  in  your  writings  &  Conversation. 

These  Books,  (for  which  I  stand  humbly  obliged  to  you) 
contain  Speculations  the  most  surprisingly  ingenious  I  have 
ever  met  with :  &  I  must  confess  that  the  Reading  of  them  has 
almost  convinced  me,  That  Matter  as  it  has  been  commonly 
defined  for  an  unknown  Quiddity  is  but  a  meer  non-Entity. 
That  it  is  a  strong  presumption  against  the  Existence  of  it,  that 
there  never  could  be  conceived  any  manner  of  connection  be- 
tween it  &  our  Ideas:  That  the  esse  of  Things  is  only  their 
percipi:  &  that  the  Rescuing  us  from  the  Absurdities  of  Ab- 
stract Ideas  &  the  Gross  Notion  of  Matter  that  have  so  much 
obtained,  deserves  well  of  the  Learned  World,  in  that  it  clears 
away  very  many  difficulties  &  Perplexities  in  the  Sciences.  .  .  . 

That  all  the  Phenomena  of  Nature  must  ultimately  be  re- 
ferred to  the  Will  of  the  Infinite  Spirit,  is  what  must  be  al- 
lowed ;  But  to  suppose  his  immediate  Energy  in  the  production 
of  every  Effect,  does  not  seem  to  impress  so  lively  &  great  a 


SAMUEL  JOHNSON:  DISCIPLE  OF  BERKELEY     21 

Sense  of  his  Power  &  wisdom  upon  our  Minds,  as  to  Suppose 
a  Subordination  of  Causes  &  Effects  among  the  Arehtypes  of 
our  Ideas  as  he  that  should  mak-^  a  watch  or  clock  of  ever  so 
beautiful  an  appearance  &  that  should  measure  the  Tkne  ever 
so  exactly,  yet  if  he  should  be  obliged  to  stand  by  it  &  influ- 
ence &  direct  all  its  motions,  he  would  seem  but  very  deficient 
in  both  his  ability  &  skill,  in  comparison  with  him  who  should 
be  able  to  make  one  that  would  regularly  keep  on  its  motion 
and  measure  the  time  for  a  considerable  time,  without  the 
Intervention  of  any  immediate  force  of  its  Author  or  any  one 
else,  impressed  upon  it.  .  .  . 

It  is  after  all  that  has  been  said  on  that  Head,  Still  some- 
thing shocking  to  many  to  think  that  there  should  be  nothmg 
but  a  meer  show  in  all  the  art  &  contrivance  appearing  in  the 
Structure,  (for  Instance)  of  a  Human  Body,  particularly  of 
the  Organs  of  Sense :  The  Curious  Structure  of  the  Eye,  what 
can  it  be  more  then  meerly  a  fine  show,  if  there  be  no  con- 
nexion more  than  you  Admit  of,  between  that  &  vision?  It 
Seems  from  the  make  of  it  to  be  designed  for  an  Instrument 
or  means  of  conveying  the  Images  of  External  Things  to  the 
perceptive  Faculty  within ;  &  if  it  be  not  so  if  it  be  really  of 
no  use  in  conveying  visible  objects  to  our  minds,  &  if  our 
visible  Ideas  are  immediately  created  in  them  by  the  Will  of 
the  Almighty,  why  should  it  be  ma.'e  to  seem  to  be  an  Instru- 
ment or  medium  as  much  as  if  indeed  it  really  were  so?  .  .  . 

To  these  and  similar  queries  Berkeley  wrote  a  series 
of  letters,  most  of  which  are  lost.  But  from  those  to 
be  found  in  his  published  works  we  learn  that  the  master 
went  to  great  pains  in  forming  the  opinions  of  his 
pupil.  How  ably  the  latter  expounded  the  doctrines 
of  universal  immaterialism  and  the  divine  visual  lan- 
guage we  shall  see  in  the  works  of  his  maturity.  Mean- 
while Johnson  had  visited  Berkeley  at  Whitehall,  the 
hitter's  country  place  near  Newport,  and  within  another 
year  Berkeley  had  finished  his  Alciphran;  or,  the  Minute 
Philosopher,  which  formed  a  most  pleasing  set  of  ideal- 
istic dialogues,  wherein,  from  their  many  allusions  and 


22  EARLY  IDEALISM 

touches  of  local  color,  Berkeley  may  be  said  to  stand  for 
Euphranor,  the  philosophic  farmer,  and  Johnson  for 
his  friend  Crito.  So  it  was  about  this  time  that  the 
neophyte  expressed  his  conversion  to  the  ideal  theory, 
since,  as  he  himself  acknowledges,  he  found  the  Dean's 
way  of  thinking  and  explaining  things  utterly  precluded 
skepticism,  and  left  no  room  for  endless  doubts  and 
uncertainties.  His  denying  matter  at  first  seemed 
shocking ;  but  it  was  only  for  want  of  giving  a  thorough 
attention  to  his  meaning.  It  was  only  the  unintelligible 
scholastic  notion  of  matter  he  disputed  and  not  any- 
thing either  sensible,  imaginable,  or  intelligible;  and 
it  was  attended  with  this  vast  advantage,  that  it  not 
only  gave  new  incontestable  proofs  of  a  deity,  but 
moreover,  the  most  striking  apprehensions  of  his  con- 
stant presence  with  us  and  inspection  over  us,  and 
of  our  entire  dependence  upon  him  and  infinite  obli- 
gations to  his  most  wise  and  almighty  benevolence. 

On  quitting  the  American  strand,  Berkeley  has  been 
most  vividly  described  as  leaving  behind  him  a  meta- 
physical double,  another  self,  sharing  his  faith,  speak- 
ing his  language;  viewing  all  things  from  the  same 
angle;  reasoning,  discussing,  concluding  as  he  himself 
had  done  or  would  have  done.  In  dedicating  his  prin- 
cipal work,  from  the  deepest  sense  of  gratitude,  to 
George,  Lord  Bishop  of  Cloyne,  Johnson  admitted  the 
truth  of  this  description,  for  he  confessed  that  he  was 
in  a  particular  manner  beholden  to  that  excellent  phi- 
losopher for  several  thoughts  that  occur  in  the  follow- 
ing tract.  This  was  the  Elementa  Philosophica:  Con- 
taining chiefly,  Noetica,  or  Things  Relating  to  the  Mind 
or  Understanding ;  and  Ethica,  or  Things  Relating  to 
the  Moral  Behavior. 

From  the  Elements  we  may  take  two  passages.     The 


SAMUEL  JOHNSON:  DISCIPLE  OF  BERKELEY     23 

first  of  these,  like  the  Irish  idealism,  emphasizes  the 
vision  of  all  things  in  God;  the  second,  with  a  certain 
colonial  independence,  gives  to  the  individual  some 
share  in  the  acquirement  of  knowledge: 

The  notices  which  the  mind  has,  derive  originally  from  (or 
rather  by  means  of)  the  two  fountains  of  sense  and  conscious- 
ness. By  means  of  the  senses  we  receive  simple  ideas.  These 
are  sorted  out  mto  a  vast  variety  of  fixed  combinations  or 
compound  ideas  distinct  from  each  other,  in  which  the  simple 
ideas  are  always  found  to  co-exist;  of  these  compound  ideas 
consist  every  individual  body  in  nature,  such  as  we  call  horse, 
tree,  &c.  These  various  distinct  combinations,  connected  to- 
gether in  such  a  manner  as  to  constitute  one  most  beautiful 
and  harmonious  whole,  make  up  what  we  call  universal  nature 
or  the  entire  sensible  or  natural  world.  In  the  perception  of 
these  ideas  or  objects  of  sense  we  find  our  minds  are  merely 
passive,  it  not  being  in  our  power  (supposing  our  organs 
rightly  disposed  and  situated)  whether  we  will  see  light  and 
colours,  hear  sounds,  &e.  We  are  not  causes  to  ourselves  of 
these  perceptions  nor  can  they  be  produced  in  our  minds  with- 
out a  cause,  or  (which  is  the  same  thing)  by  any  imagined,  un- 
intelligent, inert  or  inactive  cause.  Hence  they  must  be  de- 
rived from  an  almighty,  inteUigent,  active  cause,  exhibiting 
them  to  us,  impressing  our  minds  with  them,  or  produc- 
ing them  in  us.  Consequently  it  must  be  by  a  perpetual 
intercourse  of  our  minds  with  the  deity,  the  great  author  of 
our  beings,  or  by  his  perpetual  influence  or  activity  upon  them, 
that  they  are  possessed  of  all  these  objects  of  sense  and  the 
light  by  which  we  perceive  them.  No  sooner  does  any  object 
strike  the  senses  or  is  received  in  our  imagination,  or  appre- 
hended by  our  understanding,  but  we  are  immediately  con- 
scious of  a  kind  of  intellectual  light  within  us  (if  I  may  so 
call  it),  whereby  we  not  only  know  that  we  perceive  the  object 
but  directly  apply  ourselves  to  the  consideration  of  it  both  in 
itself,  its  properties  and  powers  and  as  it  stands  related  to  all 
other  things,  and  we  find  that  we  are  enabled  by  this  intel- 
lectual light  to  perceive  these  objects  and  their  relations  in 
like  manner  as  by  sensible  light  we  are  enabled  to  perceive 


24  EARLY  IDEALISM 

the  objects  of  sense  and  their  various  situations;  so  our  minds 
are  passive  in  this  intellectual  lijjht  as  they  are  sensible  to 
light  and  can  no  more  withstand  the  evidence  of  it  than  they 
can  withstand  the  evidence  of  sense.  Thus  I  am  under  the 
same  necessity  to  assent  to  this — that  I  am  or  have  a  being  and 
that  I  perceive  and  freely  exert  myself,  as  I  am  of  assenting 
to  this — that  I  see  colours  or  hear  sounds.  I  am  perfectly 
sure  that  2  +  2  =  4,  or  that  the  whole  is  equal  to  all  its  parts 
as  that  I  feel  heat  or  cold,  or  that  I  see  the  sun.  I  am 
intuitively  certain  of  both.  This  intellectual  light  I  conceive 
of,  as  if  it  were  a  medium  of  knowledge  just  as  sensible  light 
is  of  sight.  In  both  these  is  the  power  of  perceiving  and  the 
object  perceived;  and  this  is  the  medium  by  which  I  am 
enabled  to  know  it.  This  light  is  also  one,  and  common  to  all 
intelligent  beings,  a  Chinese  or  Japanese,  as  well  as  an  Euro- 
pean or  American.  By  it,  all  at  once  see  things  to  be  true  or 
right,  in  all  places  at  the  same  time,  and  alike  invariably  at 
all  time,  past,  present  and  to  come.  ... 

Interesting  as  were  Johnson's  philosophical  writings 
they  were  not  entirely  original.  There  is,  however,  a 
chapter  in  the  Elements  which  anticipated  by  many 
years  the  psychological  study  of  the  development  of  the 
child  mind.  At  a  time  when  another  New  England 
idealist  could  publicly  assert  that  children  were  "  like 
little  vipers,"  and  almost  an  half-century  before  the 
first  hints  of  the  kindergarten  had  reached  the  countiy, 
Johnson  gave  this  delightful  presentation  of  the  early- 
stages  of  infancy: 

The  first  notices  of  the  mind  are  doubtless  those  of  sense, 
but  directly  joined  with  a  consciousness  of  its  perception. 
Warmth  and  hunger,  and  probably  some  pains,  are,  perhaps, 
all  the  sensations  the  infant  hath  before  its  birth;  and  when 
it  comes  into  the  light  of  this  world,  it  is  directly  impressed 
with  the  sense  of  light  and  colours,  as  well  as  sounds,  tastes, 
odours,  and  frequent  uneasy  and  painful  sensations,  all  of 
which   still   more   and   more   awaken   its   consciousness;    and 


SAMUEL  JOHNSON:  DISCIPLE  OF  BERKELEY     25 

every  fresh  notice  of  sense  and  consciousness  still  goes  on  to 
excite  its  admiration  and  ensrage  its  attention.  And  being  a 
perfect  stranger  to  everything  about  it,  it  hath  everything 
to  learn ;  to  Avhicli  it  diligently  applies  itself,  as  its  conscious- 
ness more  and  more  awakens  upon  the  repetition  every  mo- 
ment, of  fresh  impressions  of  sense,  until  by  degrees,  having 
a  great  number  of  feelings,  tastes,  odours,  sounds  and  visible 
objects,  frequently  repeating  their  several  impressions,  its 
conscious  memory  still  enlarging,  it  begins,  by  means  of  the 
intellectual  light  with  which  it  finds  its  consciousness  attended, 
gradually  to  collect  and  recollect  the  several  relations  and 
connections  it  observes  to  obtain  among  its  various  ideas.  And 
at  length,  when  it  is  in  ease,  it  discovereth  a  wonderful  curi- 
osity and  delight  in  observing  these  connections,  as  well  as 
being  impressed  with  new  ideas.  Now  it  hath  b^en  made  very 
evident,  both  by  reasoning  and  experiment,  that,  as  Bishop 
Berkeley  shows  in  his  Theory  of  Vision,  the  objects  of  sight 
and  touch  are  entirely  different  and  distinct  things,  and  that 
there  is  no  necessary  connection  between  them.  It  must,  there- 
fore, be  a  matter  of  great  exercise  of  thought  in  an  infant 
mind  to  learn  this  connection,  and  particularly,  to  leam  the 
notion  of  the  various  distances  and  situations  of  things  tan- 
gible, by  its  observations  on  the  various  degrees  of  strength 
and  weakness,  of  vividness  or  faintness  of  the  light  reflected 
from  them,  in  the  things  visible  constantly  connected  with 
them.  And  at  the  same  time  that  it  hath  these  things  to  learn, 
which  must  be  a  laborious  work,  as  being  the  same  thing  with 
learning  a  language,  it  is  also  learning  the  names  of  things, 
and  the  connection  and  use  of  words,  which  is  another  lan- 
guage. And,  as  if  all  these  were  not  task  enough,  it  hath  all 
this  while  to  be  learning  how  to  use  its  limbs,  its  hand  in 
handling,  its  tongue,  and  other  organs  of  speech,  in  making 
and  imitating  sounds,  and  its  whole  body  in  all  its  exertions, 
and  particularly,  at  length,  the  poise  of  its  centre  of  gravity 
and  the  use  of  its  feet  in  walking.  All  these  things  require  a 
great  deal  of  application,  and  the  exercise  of  much  thought 
and  exertion.  So  that  it  seems  evident  that  these  little  crea- 
tures from  the  beginning,  do  consider,  reflect  and  think  a 
prodigious  deal  more  than  we  are  commonly  apt  to  imagine. 
The  reason  why  so  many  little,  low,  weak  and  childish 


26  EARLY  IDEALISM 

tliiiijjs  appear  in  (hem,  which  we  are  apt  to  despise  and  think 
beneath  our  notice,  is  not  lor  want  of  good  sense  and  capacity, 
but  merely  for  want  of  experience  and  opportunity  for  in- 
tellectual improvement.  Hence  also  it  appears  that  we  ought 
to  think  little  children  to  be  persons  of  much  more  importance 
than  we  usually  apprehend  them  to  be;  and  how  indulgent 
we  should  be  to  their  inquisitive  curiosity,  as  being  strangers; 
with  how  much  candour,  patience  and  care  we  ought  to  bear 
with  them  and  instruct  them;  with  how  much  decency,  honour 
and  integrity  we  ought  to  treat  them;  and  how  careful  it  con- 
cerns us  to  be,  not  to  say  or  do  anything  to  them  or  before 
them  that  savours  of  falsehood  and  deceit,  or  that  is  in  any 
kind  indecent  or  vicious.  Pueris  maxima  debetur  reverentia 
is  a  good  trite  old  saying. 

This  remarkable  sketch  of  the  progress  of  the  mind 
concludes  the  Xoetica.  This,  together  with  the  Ethica, 
made  up  the  Elementa  Philosophica,  which  was  used  in 
both  King's  College  during  Johnson's  presidency  and 
also  in  the  philosophy  school  of  the  Academy  of  Phila- 
delphia. And  yet  the  use  of  this  idealistic  text-book 
was  without  palpable  effect  upon  either  institution,  and 
that  because  of  an  unfavorable  environment ;  in  the  one 
case  there  was  such  a  spirit  of  commercialism  as  to 
stifle  mere  speculation,  in  the  other  such  a  tendency 
towards  materialism  that,  as  Franklin  wrote  to  John- 
son,— "  Those  parts  of  the  Elements  of  Philosophy  that 
savor  of  what  is  called  Berkeleism  are  not  well  under- 
stood here." 

But  while  Johnson  was  much  disappointed  that  his 
work  was  not  more  generally  appreciated,  he  received 
some  crumbs  of  comfort.  Benjamin  Franklin  gener- 
ously assumed  the  expense  of  printing  the  American 
edition  of  the  Elements;  William  Smith,  provost  of  the 
College  of  Philadelphia,  wrote  a  laudatory  introduc- 
tion to  the  London  edition,  and  Cadwallader  Colden, 


SAMUEL  JOHNSON:  DISCIPLE  OF  BERKELEY     27 

lieutenant-governor  of  New  York,  was  so  stimulated  by 
the  perusal  of  the  latter,  that  he  renewed  his  amicable 
controversy  with  Johnson  regarding  the  material  uni- 
verse as  a  dynamic  whole.  Although  there  were  these 
gratifying  results  for  the  Connecticut  idealist  in  Penn- 
sylvania and  New  York,  in  other  provinces  there  was  a 
different  condition  of  affairs.  During  Berkeley's  so- 
journ in  Rhode  Island,  Edwards  was  living  in  Massa- 
chusetts, yet  here  there  were  no  sure  signs  of  the 
Irish  idealism  to  be  found.  Even  the  college  at  Cam- 
bridge was  so  satisfied  with  its  own  speculations,  so 
wrapped  up  in  its  peculiar  ecclesiasticism,  that  it  paid 
no  attention  to  the  distinguished  foreign  visitor  of 
another  faith.  The  same  result  obtained  in  New  Jersey, 
but  for  somewhat  different  causes.  Harvard  was  ration- 
alistic to  a  degree,  but  Princeton  was  so  imbued  with 
the  common  sense  philosophy  that  the  Berkeleian  ideal- 
ism, which  had  somehow  stolen  into  that  abode  of 
orthodoxy,  was  denominated  a  mere  philosophical  day- 
dream. 

Besides  these  special  causes  there  were  general  causes 
for  the  American  indifference  to  Berkeleism.  It  has 
been  declared  the  fault  of  circumstances  that  Johnson's 
book  fell  on  a  time  when  the  New  World  was  engaged 
in  conquests  in  the  material  rather  than  in  the  spiritual 
sphere.  A  Gallic  critic  finds  this  a  polite  but  shrewd 
way  of  saying  that  Anglo-Americans  of  the  late  eight- 
eenth century  were  unfit  to  receive  or  to  develop  a  true 
idealism,  for  what  was  true  in  the  British  colonies  was 
also  true  in  the  mother  country.  The  indifference  with 
which  Johnson's  work  was  received  in  England  was 
owing  to  its  appearance  at  a  moment  the  most  in- 
opportune ;  the  spiritualistic  philosophy  was  then  losing 
ground,  a  crass  sensualism  or  a  radical  skepticism  was 


28  EARLY  IDEALISM 

taking  its  place.  If  Johnson  could  have  presented  his 
immaterialism  to  an  entirely  new  age,  he  might  have 
arrested  general  attention.  The  most  that  can  now 
be  said  of  his  endeavors  was  that  he  was  the  meta- 
physical double,  the  ideal  image  of  the  good  Bishop  of 
Cloyne,  but  withal  unsuccessful  in  spreading,  to  any 
groat  extent,  that  form  of  idealism  for  which  the  latter 
stood. 

2.   Jonathan  Edwards,  Mystic 

Tradition  has  marked  Jonathan  Edwards  as  the 
greatest  of  our  Puritan  divines,  the  relentless  logician 
who  left  the  print  of  his  iron  heel  upon  the  New  Eng- 
land conscience.  It  is  true  that  Edwards  delivered  the 
dreadful  Enfield  sermon  "  Sinners  in  the  Hands  of  an 
Angry  God,"  and  that  he  composed  that  rigid  treatise, 
concerning  the  Freedom  of  the  Will,  which  belied  its 
title  and  doomed  the  bulk  of  mankind  to  the  workings 
of  an  inexorable  fate.  But  this  is  only  one  side  of  the 
picture.  In  public  Edwards  was  the  pitiless  profes- 
sional theologian.  In  private  he  was  poet,  mystic,  phi- 
losopher of  the  feelings.  As  a  boy  he  reached  the 
thought  that  **  this  world  exists  nowhere  but  in  the 
mind."  As  a  young  man  he  used  frequently  to  "  retire 
into  a  solitary  place  on  the  banks  of  the  Hudson 's  Kiver 
for  contemplation  on  divine  things."  In  maturity  he 
wrote  his  treatise  concerning  Religious  Affections  in 
which  he  described  the  true  believers'  soul  as  receiving 
light  from  the  sun  of  righteousness  in  such  a  manner 
that  their  nature  is  changed,  that  they  become  little 
suns  partaking  of  the  nature  of  the  fountain  of  their 
light. 

This  inward  and  intimate  side  of  the  "  saint  of  New 
England  "  is  that  which  makes  him   pre-eminently  a 


JONATHAN  EDWARDS,  MYSTIC  29 

mystic  and  seeker  after  the  interior  or  hidden  life.  At 
a  very  early  age  he  built  himself  a  hut  in  a  swamp. 
There  he  communed  with  his  God,  became  enamored 
of  nature,  and  reached  the  conclusion  that  the  one  was 
but  the  expression  of  the  other.  As  he  put  it  in  one  of 
his  later  writings:  "We  have  shown  that  the  Son  of 
God  created  the  world  for  this  very  end — ^to  communi- 
cate Himself  an  image  of  His  own  excellency.  .  .  . 
When  we  behold  the  light  and  brightness  of  the  sun, 
the  golden  edges  of  an  evening  cloud,  or  the  beauteous 
bow,  we  behold  the  adumbrations  of  His  glory  and  good- 
ness; and  in  the  blue  sky,  of  His  mildness  and  gentle- 
ness. There  are  also  many  things  wherein  we  may 
behold  His  awful  majesty:  in  the  sun  in  his  strength, 
in  comets,  in  thunder,  with  the  lowering  thunder-clouds, 
in  ragged  rocks  and  the  brows  of  mountains." 

We  are  then  to  count  Edwards  a  mystic  because  of 
his  wonderful  sense  of  the  immediateness  of  the  divine 
presence  and  agency.  But  in  addition  to  his  youthful 
ecstasy  he  had  a  philosophical  basis  for  his  convictions. 
Shortly  after  entering  Yale  College  at  the  age  of  twelve, 
he  wrote  a  little  essay  which  had  this  as  its  corollary, — 
"  it  follows  from  hence  that  those  beings  which  have 
knowledge  and  Consciousness  are  the  Only  Proper  and 
Keal  And  substantial  beings,  inasmuch  as  the  being  of 
other  things  is  Only  by  these,  from  hence  we  may  see 
the  Gross  mistake  of  those  who  think  material  things 
the  most  substantial  beings  and  spirits  more  like  a 
shadow,  whereas  spirits  Only  Are  Properly  Substance." 
This  is  the  famous  undergraduate  paper  entitled  Of 
Being,  which  has  been  declared  as  precocious  as  the 
Thoughts  of  Pascal  and  also  remarkable  as  the  counter- 
part of  Berkeley's  theoiy  of  the  divine  visual  language. 
As  to  its  originality  there  are  many  reasons  for  thinking 


30  EARLY  IDEALISM 

that  the  young  Puritan  did  not  borrow  from  the  Church 
of  England  divine.  There  is  the  negative  reason  that 
the  given  eoroUary  follows  from  a  supposition  to  the 
contrary.  .  .  .  Let  us  suppose  for  illustration  this  im- 
possibility that  all  the  Spirits  in  the  Universe  to  be  for 
a  time  to  be  Deprived  of  their  Consciousness,  and  Gods 
Consciousness  at  the  same  time  to  be  intermitted.  I 
say  the  Universe  for  that  time  would  cease  to  be  of  it  self 
and  not  only  as  we  speak  because  the  almighty  Could 
not  attend  to  Uphold  the  world  but  because  God  knew 
nothing  of  it.  .  .  . 

There  is  also  the  positive  reason  that  Edwards  gives 
a  definition  of  the  divine  language  of  signs  which  has 
been  declared  truly  marvelous  as  emanating  from  a 
mere  boy.  .  .  .  Indeed,  reasons  Edwards,  the  secret  lies 
here :  That,  which  truly  is  the  Substance  of  all  bodies^ 
is  the  infinitely  exact,  and  precise,  and  perfectly  stable 
Idea,  in  God's  mind,  together  with  His  stable  Will,  that 
the  same  shall  gradually  be  communicated  to  us,  and 
to  other  minds,  according  to  certain  fixed  and  exact 
established  Methods  and  Laws ;  or  in  somewhat  different 
language,  the  infinitely  exact  and  precise  Divine  Idea, 
together  with  an  answerable,  perfectly  exact,  precise, 
and  stable  "Will,  with  respect  to  correspondent  com- 
munications to  Created  Minds,  and  effects  on  their 
minds. 

The  logical  side  of  Edwards's  mind  is  not  that  which 
we  would  dwell  on.  It  is  the  poetical  and  the  mystical 
which  give  a  truer  insight  into  his  nature.  The  first  hint 
of  his  quietistic  experience  is  given  in  the  phrase  that 
"  nothing  "  is  "  the  same  that  the  sleeping  rocks  dream 
of."  The  next  is  in  his  definition  of  inspiration  as 
an  absolute  sense  of  certainty,  a  knowledge  in  a  sense 
intuitive,  wherein  such  bright  ideas  are  raised,  and  such 


JONATHAN  EDWARDS,  MYSTIC  31 

a  clear  view  of  a  perfect  agreement  with  the  excellencies 
of  the  Divine  Nature,  that  it  is  known  to  be  a  communi- 
cation from  II im  ;  all  the  Deity  appears  in  the  thing,  and 
in  everything  pertaining  to  it. 

Edwards  is  convinced  of  the  verity  of  mystical  intui- 
tion. At  the  same  time  he  is  wise  enough  to  state  that 
while  this  may  be  immediate,  it  does  not  come  all  at 
once  nor  arise  without  painful  preparation.  There  are 
three  stages  in  the  process:  first,  comes  by  great  and 
violent  inward  struggles  the  gaining  of  a  spirit  to  part 
with  all  things  in  the  world;  then,  a  kind  of  vision  or 
certain  fixed  ideas  and  images  of  being  alone  in  the 
mountains  or  some  solitary  wilderness  far  from  all 
mankind;  finally,  a  thought  of  being  wrapt  up  in  God 
in  heaven,  being,  as  it  were,  swallowed  up  in  Ilim  for- 
ever. In  these  few  words  Edwards  has  summed  up  the 
mystic  progression  presented  in  the  ancient  manuals, 
those  three  stages  in  the  ladder  of  perfection, — first, 
the  purgative,  brought  about  by  contrition  and  amend- 
ment ;  then,  the  illuminative,  produced  by  concentration 
of  all  the  faculties  upon  God;  lastly,  the  intuitive 
or  unitive,  wherein  man  beholds  God  face  to  face  and  is 
joined  to  Him  in  perfect  union.  In  a  passage  of  ex- 
quisite beauty,  which  may  well  be  called  a  classic  of 
the  inner  life,  the  saint  of  New  England  thus  proceeds 
to  unfold  the  record  of  his  youthful  ecstasy : — 

After  this  my  sense  of  divine  things  gradually  increased, 
and  became  more  and  more  lively,  and  had  more  of  that  inward 
sweetness.  The  appearance  of  everj-thing  was  altered;  there 
seemed  to  be,  as  it  were,  a  calm,  sweet  cast,  or  appearance  of 
divine  glory,  in  almost  everything.  God's  excellency,  his  wis- 
dom, his  purity  and  love,  seemed  to  appear  in  every  thing;  in 
the  sun,  moon,  and  stars;  in  the  clouds,  and  the  blue  sky;  in 
the  gi-ass,  flowers,  trees;  in  the  water,  and  all  nature;  which 


32  EARLY  IDEALISM 

used  greatly  to  fix  my  mind.  I  often  used  to  sit  and  view  the 
moon  for  continuance;  and  in  the  day,  spent  much  time  view- 
ing the  clouds  and  sky,  to  behold  the  sweet  glory  of  God  in 
these  things:  in  the  mean  time,  singing  forth,  with  a  low  voice, 
my  contemplations  of  the  Creator  and  Redeemer.  And  scarce 
any  thing,  among  all  the  works  of  nature  was  so  sweet  to  me 
as  thunder  and  lightning;  formerly,  nothing  had  been  so  terrible 
to  me.  Before,  I  used  to  be  uncommonly  terrified  with  thunder 
and  to  be  struck  with  terror  when  I  saw  a  thunder-storm 
rising;  but  now,  on  the  contrary,  it  rejoiced  me.  I  felt  God, 
so  to  speak,  at  the  first  appearance  of  a  thunder-storm;  and 
used  to  take  the  opportunity,  at  such  times,  to  fix  myself  in 
order  to  view  the  clouds,  and  see  the  lightnings  play,  and  hear 
the  majestic  and  awful  voice  of  God's  thunder  which  often- 
times was  exceedingly  entertaining,  leading  me  to  sweet  con- 
templations of  my  sweet  and  glorious  God.  While  thus 
engaged,  it  always  seemed  natural  to  me  to  sing,  or  chant  forth 
my  meditations;  or,  to  speak  my  thoughts  in  soliloquies  with  a 
singing  voice.  Holiness,  as  I  then  wrote  down  some  of  my  con- 
templations on  it,  appeared  to  me  to  be  of  a  sweet,  pleasant, 
charming,  serene  calm  nature;  which  brought  an  inexpressible 
purity,  brightness,  peacefulness,  and  ravishment  to  the  soul. 
In  other  words,  that  it  made  the  soul  like  a  field  or  garden  of 
God,  with  all  manner  of  pleasant  flowers;  all  pleasant,  de- 
lightful, and  undisturbed;  enjoying  a  sweet  calm,  and  the 
gently  vivifying  beams  of  the  sun.  The  soul  of  a  true  Chris- 
tian, as  I  then  wrote  my  meditations,  appeared  like  such  a 
little  white  flower  as  we  see  in  the  spring  of  the  year;  low, 
and  humble  on  the  ground,  opening  its  bosom,  to  receive  the 
pleasant  beams  of  the  sun's  glory;  rejoicing,  as  it  were,  in  a 
calm  rapture;  diffusing  around  a  sweet  fragrancy;  standing 
peacefully  and  lovingly,  in  the  midst  of  other  flowers  round 
about ;  all  in  like  manner  opening  their  bosoms,  to  drink  in 
the  light  of  the  sun.  There  was  no  part  of  creature-holiness, 
that  I  had  so  great  a  sense  of  its  loveliness  as  humility,  broken- 
ness  of  heart,  and  poverty  of  spirit;  and  there  was  nothing 
that  I  so  earnestly  longed  for.  My  heart  panted  after  this, — 
to  lie  low  before  God,  as  in  the  dust;  that  I  might  be  nothing, 
and  that  God  might  be  ALL. 


JONATHAN  EDWARDS,  MYSTIC  33 

In  the  concluding  passage  of  this  exquisite  rhap- 
sody there  appear  what  have  been  called  the  un- 
mistakable marks  of  the  mystic  in  every  age, — the 
desire  to  be  united  with  the  divine,  the  longing  to  be 
absorbed  into  the  inmost  essence  of  the  Absolute.  But  in 
Edwards's  full  narrative  there  are  also  to  be  found  the 
marks  of  mysticism  from  the  modern  point  of  view.  Let 
us  now  submit  the  matter  to  the  test  of  the  psychology 
of  religion.  William  James  has  given  the  proper  marks 
of  mysticism  as  four  in  number:  Ineffability, — the  sub- 
ject of  it  immediately  says  that  it  defies  expression,  that 
no  adequate  report  of  its  contents  can  be  given  in  words, 
— in  this  peculiarity  mental  states  are  more  like  states 
of  feeling  than  like  states  of  intellect.  The  noetic  qual- 
ity,— although  so  similar  to  states  of  feeling,  mystical 
states  seem  to  those  who  experience  them  to  be  states  of 
knowledge ;  they  are  states  of  insight,  illuminations, 
revelations,  full  of  significance  and  importance,  all  in- 
articulate though  they  remain.  Transiency, — mystical 
states  cannot  be  sustained  for  long,  their  quality  can 
be  but  imperfectly  reproduced  in  memory,  yet  this  is 
susceptible  of  continuous  development  in  what  is  felt  as 
inner  richness  and  importance.  Passivity, — the  oncom- 
ing of  mystical  states  can  be  facilitated  by  preliminary 
voluntary  operations,  yet  when  the  characteristic  sort 
of  consciousness  has  once  set  in,  the  mystic  feels  as  if 
his  own  will  were  in  abeyance. 

We  may  apply  these  tests  to  the  records  of  Edwards's 
inner  life  in  order  to  gain  a  further  insight  into  his 
mental  processes.  The  mark  of  transiency  may  be  neg- 
lected. The  brief  duration,  the  constant  intermittence, 
is  an  accident,  not  an  essential  of  the  mystic  state.  Ed- 
wards complained  that  his  earlier  affections  were  lively 
and  easily  moved,  and  that  it  was  only  after  he  had  spent 


34  EARLY  IDEALISM 

most  of  his  time,  year  after  year,  in  meditation  and 
solilo(iuy  that  liis  sense  of  divine  things  seemed  gradually 
to  increase.  Leaving  aside,  then,  the  mark  of  transiency, 
one  reaches  the  more  important  mark  of  passivity.  Here 
Edwards  says  in  his  early  notes  on  the  ]\Iind :  Our 
perceptions  or  ideas  that  we  passively  receive  through 
our  bodies  are  communicated  to  us  immediately  by 
God.  There  never  can  be  any  idea,  thought,  or  action 
of  the  mind  unless  the  mind  first  received  some  ideas 
from  sensation,  or  some  other  way  equivalent,  wherein 
the  mind  is  wholly  passive  in  receiving  them. 

We  should  note,  in  passing,  that  there  is  here  given 
a  clew  to  Edwards's  precocious  idealism.  The  passive 
or  quietistic  state  readily  lends  itself  to  a  sense  of  the 
unreality  of  the  external  world.  In  Edwards's  lan- 
guage this  takes  the  form  of  a  belief  that  corporeal 
things  could  exist  no  otherwise  than  mentall}^  and  that 
other  bodies  have  no  existence  of  their  own.  In  modern 
psychological  terms  the  recognition  of  the  unreal  sense 
of  things  may  be  laid  to  a  temporary  absence  of  con- 
£Esthesia,  a  transient  loss  of  the  sense  of  the  compact 
reality  of  the  bodily  organism.  Furthermore,  this  in- 
direct phenomenalism,  this  extreme  subjectivism,  being 
carried  to  its  logical  extreme,  might  well  lead  to  the 
conclusion  embodied  in  Edwards's  first  fragment,  the 
corollary  of  the  essay  on  Being,  which  protested 
against  the  view  that  material  things  are  the  most 
substantial,  and  affirmed  that  spirits  only  are  properly 
substances. 

Vivid,  intense,  personal  impressions  furnish  in  largest 
measure  the  substance  of  Edwards's  idealism.  But  that 
idealism  was  only  suppplementary,  only  an  afterthought 
to  his  mysticism.  We  return  therefore  to  that  most 
positive  mark  of  mysticism— the  noetic  quality.    In  his 


JONATHAN  EDWARDS,  MYSTIC  35 

maturer  essays  on  the  Spiritual  Light  and  the  Religious 
Affections  Edwards  attempts  to  express  the  manner  and 
means  of  his  conviction  of  that  "  new  sense  of  things  " 
quite  different  from  anything  he  ever  expressed  before. 
As  a  sign  of  the  thoroughness  of  his  thinking  he  takes 
pains  to  present  the  negative  side.  What  is  this  divine 
and  supernatural  light  immediately  imparted  to  the 
soul  by  the  Spirit  of  God?  ...  It  does  not  consist  in 
any  impression  made  upon  the  imagination,  as  when  one 
may  be  entertained  by  a  romantic  description  of  the 
pleasantness  of  fairy-land,  or  be  affected  by  what  one 
reads  in  a  romance,  or  sees  acted  in  a  stage-play.  No, 
rather  as  he  that  beholds  objects  on  the  face  of  the 
earth,  when  the  light  of  the  sun  is  cast  upon  them,  is 
under  greater  advantage  to  discern  them  in  their  true 
forms  and  natural  relations,  than  he  that  sees  them  in 
a  dim  twilight,  so  God,  in  letting  light  into  the  soul, 
deals  with  man  according  to  his  nature  and  makes  use 
of  his  rational  faculties. 

So  far  as  Edwards  was  concerned,  the  objects  of  the 
mystical  knowledge  were  as  substantial  realities  as  his 
Berkshire  mountains,  yet  he  felt  obliged  to  bring  home 
to  others  the  proper  rationality  of  that  knowledge. 
Then,  too,  the  treatise  on  the  Religious  Affections  being 
called  forth  by  the  revival  which  had  meanwhile  swept 
over  his  parish,  the  Puritan  divine  was  in  a  further  dififi- 
cult  position,  for  he  stood  midway  between  the  skeptics 
of  his  age  and  those  persons  who  were  of  abnormal 
emotional  sensibility.  On  the  one  side,  he  explains,  are 
many  in  these  days  who  condemn  the  affections  which 
are  excited  in  a  way  that  seems  not  to  be  the  natural 
consequence  of  the  faculties  and  principles  of  human 
nature;  on  the  other  side  are  those  of  a  weak  and 
vapory  habit  of  body  and  of  brain  easily  susceptive  of 


36  EARLY  IDEALISM 

iinpn'ssions;  as  a  person  asleep  has  dreams  of  which  he 
is  not  the  voluntary  author,  so  may  such  persons,  in 
like  manner,  be  the  subjects  of  involuntary  impressions, 
when  they  are  awake.  But  the  true  saint  belongs  to 
neither  of  these.  In  him  the  divine  spirit  may  co- 
operate in  a  silent,  secret,  and  undiscernible  way,  with 
the  use  of  means,  and  his  own  endeavors,  and  yet  that 
is  not  all.  Spiritual  light  may  be  let  into  the  soul  in 
one  way,  when  it  is  not  in  another;  in  a  dead  carnal 
frame,  it  is  as  impossible  that  it  should  be  kept  alive  in 
its  clearness  and  strength  as  it  is  to  keep  the  light  in 
the  room  when  the  candle  that  gives  it  is  put  out,  or 
to  maintain  the  bright  sunshine  in  the  air  when  the 
sun  is  gone  down. 

By  this  final  figure  of  speech  Edwards  has  expressed 
more  than  the  inadequacy  of  reason  to  explain  the 
mystery  of  the  inner  life.  The  figure  is  itself  a  reason 
which  explains  why  Puritan  mysticism  failed  to  spread 
in  the  land.  Edwards  himself  was  the  chief  luminary  in 
that  system,  and  with  his  eclipse  came  irreparable  loss. 
He  was  not  only  the  chief  of  New  England  divines,  but 
the  chief  native  exponent  of  the  scholastic  of  the  heart, 
the  dialectic  of  the  feelings.  But  those  teachings  of 
his  had  now  a  lessening  audience.  In  the  mid-year  of  the 
century  he  was  forced  by  an  unhappy  estrangement 
from  his  pastorship  at  Northampton  and  driven  from 
the  haunts  of  scholarship  to  the  edge  of  the  Western 
wilderness  and  into  actual  peril  from  the  inroads  of 
the  savages.  And  so  his  arduous  missionary  labors 
among  the  Indians  at  Stockbridge  had  much  to  do  in 
preventing  the  elaboration  of  his  mystical  doctrine. 


MYSTICISM  37 

3.   Mysticism:  From  Quakerism  to  Christian  Science 

The  spreading  of  Edwards's  mystical  beliefs  was 
thwarted  by  local  conditions.  But  there  were  other 
and  more  general  causes  at  work  to  prevent  the  ac- 
ceptance of  such  tenets.  For  one  thing,  orthodox 
Puritanism  was  opposed  to  the  belief  in  a  "  divine  and 
supernatural  light  immediately  imparted  to  the  soul." 
As  Increase  Mather  declared :  Here  on  earth  we  have 
but  a  dark  and  very  imperfect  knowledge  of  God ;  only 
in  heaven  do  the  glorified  saints  have  the  beatific  vision. 
The  reason  for  this  restriction  is  not  hard  to  find.  The 
notion  of  self-illumination  was  abhorrent  to  those  be- 
lievers in  historic  revelations  and  oracles,  who  consid- 
ered that  they  already  possessed  sufficient  sources  of 
inspiration  in  the  Bible,  the  church,  and  reason.  Of 
these  three  the  first  was  counted  chiefest.  "  The  word 
of  God  as  contained  in  the  Scriptures  "  was  the  final 
record  of  the  divine  message  to  men.  So,  as  Edward 
Channing  has  said  in  the  ease  of  Mistress  Anne  Hutch- 
inson, the  conception  that  any  man — much  less  any 
woman — should  pretend  to  be  inspired  by  the  Almighty 
was  not  to  be  held  for  one  instant. 

Orthodox  Puritanism  was  therefore  out  of  all  sym- 
pathy with  mysticism.  Only  contempt  met  the  "  famil- 
ist,"  who  depended  upon  rare  revelations  and  forsook 
the  revealed  word.  This  explains  not  only  the  neglect 
of  Edwards  as  mystic,  but  the  Puritan  persecution  of 
the  Quakers  in  Massachusetts,  and  Puritan  hatred  of 
the  colony  of  Rhode  Island,  where  all  quietistie  brethren 
were  welcome.  This  colony  was  to  its  neighbors  "  the 
drain  or  sink  of  opinionists."  To  Friends  it  was  a 
"  true  port  and  quiet  habitat."  Nevertheless  Roger 
Williams  and  his  adherents  were  enabled  to  make  but 


38  EARLY  IDEALISM 

little  impression  on  the  times,  for  the  reason  that  New 
England  was  too  narrow  in  its  views.  So  it  remained 
for  the  broader  acres  to  the  South  to  take  in  those  who 
cared  for  the  contemplative  life.  Foremost  of  these 
were  William  Penn  and  the  Pennsylvania  Quakers.  The 
latter  term,  as  is  well  known,  is  derisive  not  descriptive. 
Not  Quakers,  but  Friends  is  the  proper  designation.  As 
one  of  their  own  number  has  said  :  ' '  There  is  a  principle 
which  is  pure,  placed  in  the  human  mind,  which  in 
different  places  and  ages  has  had  different  names;  it  is, 
however,  pure  and  proceeds  from  God.  It  is  deep  and 
inward,  confined  to  no  forms  of  religion,  nor  excluded 
from  any,  when  the  heart  stands  in  perfect  sincerity. 
In  whomsoever  this  takes  root  and  grows  they  become 
brethren." 

This  is  the  statement  of  John  Woolman,  the  humble 
tailor  of  New  Jersey.  It  may  be  supplemented  by  that 
of  the  royal  proprietary  of  Pennsylvania.  William 
Penn  had  sent  to  his  friends  a  Key  opening  the  Way 
to  every  Capacity.  The  key  is  to  be  found  in  personal 
illumination;  not  the  light  of  mere  reason,  but  some- 
thing higher.  This  light,  it  is  explained,  is  some- 
thing else  than  the  bare  understanding  man  hath  as  a 
rational  creature;  since,  as  such,  man  cannot  be  a  light 
to  himself.  .  .  .  For  we  can  no  more  be  a  mental  or 
intellectual  light  to  ourselves,  than  we  are  an  external 
corporeal  light  to  ourselves.  What  Penn  expressed 
negatively  another  of  the  primitive  Friends  expressed 
positively:  That  which  God  hath  given  us  the  experi- 
ence of,  is  the  mystery,  the  hidden  life,  the  inward 
spiritual  appearance  of  our  Lord. 

We  have  reached  the  second  stage  in  the  search  for 
the  sources  of  mystic  illumination.  As  to  divine  truth, 
the  Puritans  had  taught  that  the  Bible  gives,  the  church 


MYSTICISM  39 

expounds,  the  reason  accepts.  The  Quakers  now  pro- 
ceed to  drop  the  second  channel  of  communication.  To 
them  there  is  no  need  of  other  men  as  intermediaries, 
since  it  is  Christ's  light  communicated  to  the  soul  that 
makes  manifest  the  things  that  belong  to  the  soul's 
peace.  Such  a  sentiment  as  this  makes  a  priesthood 
and  even  a  ministry  unnecessary.  In  their  stead,  then, 
arise  the  Friends'  meeting-houses, — places  for  "  silence 
and  heavenly  frames."  Here  the  congregation  awaits 
the  moving  of  the  Spirit,  since  it  is  held  that  resigna- 
tion and  quietness  are  the  safest  way  to  attain  the  clear 
discerning  of  the  motions  of  truth. 

The  process  of  elimination  did  not  stop  even  here. 
While  the  orthodox  Friends  appealed  both  to  the  Bible 
and  reason,  the  unorthodox  or  Hicksite  Friends  ap- 
pealed to  reason,  so  far  as  possible  unfettered  by  Scrip- 
ture. They  argued  that  if  reason  alone  is  competent 
to  reach  divine  truth,  revelation  is  superfluous.  Thus 
Elias  Hieks  took  the  traditional  Quaker  inspiration  for 
the  union  of  self  with  a  larger  whole  and  tried  to  turn 
the  feeling  regarding  "  the  universal  divine  principle  " 
into  a  conclusion  concerning  the  ' '  fullness  of  God  in  us 
and  in  every  blade  of  grass."  An  opponent  called  this 
a  wandering  off  into  the  dreary  wastes  of  pantheism. 
We  dissent  from  the  description  except  in  so  far  as  there 
was  a  real  tendency  towards  a  philosophical  monism. 

At  this  point  we  have  apparently  reached  the  conclu- 
sion of  the  whole  matter.  All  three  channels  of  mystical 
communication  seem  exhausted,  yet  the  process  of  elimi- 
nation was  carried  even  further.  That  inward  fellow- 
.  ship,  received  immediately  from  the  divine  fountain, 
was  now  sought  by  a  group  of  mystics  who  cared  less 
for  the  Bible,  the  church,  and  reason,  than  for  reason 
transcended.    It  was  the  so-called  Pennsylvania  Pietists, 


40  EARLY  IDEALISM 

wlio  sought  1)3'  direct  intuition  to  get  at  "  tlie  world 
behind  this  world."  Their  quest  was  for  "  the  real 
above  all  reason,  beyond  all  thought."  Such  was  the 
actual  aim  of  Conrad  Beissel,  head  of  the  monastic  com- 
munity at  Ephrata  near  Philadelphia.  Unfortunately 
these  speculations  in  the  "  camp  of  the  solitary  "  were 
hidden  behind  a  veil  of  theosophic  lore, — the  esoteric 
doctrine  of  the  Sophia  or  principle  of  wisdom.  Penn- 
sylvania Pietists,  like  the  European  brotherhood  of 
which  they  were  a  branch,  sought  to  be  tasters  of  su- 
preme experience,  but  their  quest  of  the  truly  transcen- 
dental, of  knowledge  above  knowledge,  was  only  laughed 
at  by  their  neighbors  and  contemporaries.  As  a  writer 
of  the  day  expressed  it:  "  Cabbalists  and  Quietists  all 
affect  a  mystical  language,  a  dark  kind  of  canting; 
they  talk  much  of  a  light  within  them,  instead  of  com- 
mon sense, — whoever  shall  reconcile  all  these  must  be 
an  CEdipus  indeed." 

Because  of  this  essentially  Anglo-Saxon  way  of  re- 
garding mysticism  and  nonsense  as  convertible  terms,  it 
is  not  surprising  that  early  mysticism  in  America  rap- 
idly evaporated.  One  reason  for  its  comparative  failure 
has  already  been  given :  It  opposed  the  standards  set  by 
church  and  by  Scripture.  But  there  were  other  reasons. 
Beside  being  unorthodox,  it  was  inarticulate  or  without 
a  vehicle  of  self-expression.  There  was,  of  course,  Ed- 
wards's quietistie  tractate  on  the  Affections,  but  that 
was  counteracted  by  the  excesses  of  the  religious  re- 
vivals. Outside  of  this  there  was  no  native  book  which 
could  serve  as  a  mystic  manual.  John  Woolman's 
Journal  was  only  rescued  from  oblivion  by  the  Quaker 
poet  Whittier.  William  Penn's  No  Cross,  No  Crown, 
written  in  the  Tower  of  London,  went  through  several 
American  editions,  but  it  was  too  didactic  to  attract  wide 


MYSTICISM  41 

attention.  "  Think  not  thine  own  thoughts,"  "  "Wait 
to  feel  something  divine," — directions  such  as  these 
lacked  the  poetic  and  imaginative  touch  necessary  to 
mystic  enthusiasm.  So  without  living  native  sources 
the  stream  ran  dry.  Recourse  was  had  to  foreign  parts. 
During  the  century  of  Quaker  Quietism  translations  of 
Fenelon  and  even  of  Juan  de  Valdes  were  circulated 
among  American  Friends,  but  the  imagery  of  France 
and  of  Spain  was  hardly  in  keeping  with  that  of  the  New 
World. 

Besides  being  inarticulate,  native  mysticism  was  in- 
opportune. At  the  end  of  its  century  Quakerism  should 
have  borne  the  fruit  of  literary  expression.  But  cir- 
cumstances were  against  that  fruition.  The  Eevolu- 
tionary  War  arose  and  the  results  to  mystical  men  of 
peace  were  disastrous,  militarism  being  by  nature  op- 
posed to  mysticism ;  pomp,  and  outward  show  to  the 
quiet  concentration  of  all  the  inner  forces  of  the  soul 
upon  supernatural  objects.  And  this  quest  of  a  world 
beyond  this  world  was  hindered  by  another  circum- 
stance,— the  cessation  of  immigration  from  the  home 
country.  For  the  Society  of  Friends  this  meant  that 
there  was  no  one  to  take  the  place  of  such  men  as 
Robert  Barclay,  and  for  the  Pennsylvania  Pietists  of 
such  men  as  Conrad  Beissel.  While  both  English  and 
German  suffered  from  the  lack  of  fresh  blood,  new  rivals 
arose  in  the  coming  of  the  Scotch-Irish.  In  place  of  the 
men  of  feeling  and  sentiment  came  the  men  of  cold 
intellect  and  plain  common  sense.  With  Philadelphia  as 
their  chief  point  of  entry  these  dogmatists  spread  over 
the  very  regions,  West  and  South,  into  which  pietists 
and  Quakers  had  made  their  timid  advances.  This 
matter  is  one  of  the  psychology  of  race  and  the  survival 
of  the  fittest.     As  regards  number  and  influence  the 


42  EARLY  IDEALISM 

soft-hcartod  were  supplanted  by  the  hard-headed.  And 
the  latter  wore  also  helped  by  their  spiritual  kin,  the 
deists.  It  was  a  characteristic  of  the  rationalist  to  look 
at  "  enthusiasts  "  with  a  coldly  critical  eye.  The  fol- 
lowers of  Penn  were  not  openly  derided  because  their 
commercial  standing  was  secure  and  their  social  posi- 
tion assured.  But  the  followers  of  Jacob  Boehme  were 
called  fantastic,  and  Franklin,  who  printed  some  of  the 
"  Dutch  "  books,  had  only  contempt  for  those  Quietists 
who  removed  hither  from  Germany. 

We  must  now  attempt  to  estimate  the  value  and 
results  of  early  American  mysticism.  It  was  unortho- 
dox, it  was  inarticulate,  it  was  inopportune.  Was  it 
ineffective?  There  are  some  who  hold  that  mysticism 
is  by  nature  passive  and  theoretical,  not  active  and 
practical.  They  claim  that  the  mystical  life  is  a  life  of 
contemplation,  not  of  ethical  energy ;  that  the  individual, 
being  lost  in  the  excess  of  divine  light,  loses  his  sense 
of  personality.  To  such  critics  we  offer  these  facts: 
William  Penn's  treaty  with  the  Indians,  John  Wool- 
man's  protest  against  slavery,  and  the  continued  agita- 
tion of  the  Society  of  Friends  against  militarism,  from 
the  time  of  the  Revolution  to  this  year's  Mohonk  Con- 
ference. To  those  who  would  scornfully  say  that  mys- 
ticism is  by  nature  theoretical  and  never  practical,  we 
point  not  only  to  this  list  of  emancipators,  abolitionists, 
pacificists,  but  to  the  causes  which  underlay  their  ac- 
tivities. That  cause  has  been  suggested  by  Whittier. 
It  was  that  they  were  men  who  sincerely  applied  their 
minds  to  true  virtue  and  found  an  inward  support  from 
above.  Nevertheless  a  compromise  must  be  made  be- 
tween critic  and  defender.  Our  early  American  mys- 
ticism was  in  a  sense  ineffective.  Privately  the  practice 
of  quietism  engendered  a  state  of  tender  sensibility  and 


MYSTICISM  43 

an  appreciation  of  the  higher  morality.  But  publicly 
the  movement  did  not  spread  because  it  was  not  a  truly 
social  movement.  Quietists  were  in  one  sense  separatists. 
Beside  their  matrimonial  segregation  they  had  their  own 
meeting-houses  and  brotherhoods,  and  communities  like 
that  started  by  Count  Zinzendorf,  near  Sharon,  Con- 
necticut. Such  segregation  put  them  out  of  joint  with 
the  times.  The  country  needed  public  participation  by 
all  in  the  era  of  political  reconstruction,  and  the  sub- 
sequent era  of  commercial  expansion.  But  after  the 
adoption  of  the  Constitution,  and  after  the  winning  of 
the  West,  there  arose  again  a  felt  need  for  private  con- 
templation. This  need  was  supplied  in  part  by  the 
transcendentalists  of  New  England.  Emerson  found 
in  nature  the  "  dial  plate  of  the  invisible  ";  Upham 
saw  in  Christianity  a  field  for  the  cultivation  of  the 
interior  or  hidden  life.  But  this  second  mystical 
movement,  like  the  first,  was  disturbed  by  a  similar  set 
of  events, — another  war,  another  period  of  reconstruc- 
tion, another  territorial  expansion.  So  it  was  not  until 
the  present  generation  that  there  was  either  leisure  or 
occasion  for  the  cultivation  of  quietism. 

Some  have  called  the  present  phase  New  Thought.  It 
should  rather  be  called  the  oldest  of  thought  in  a  new  set- 
ting. As  will  be  shown  subsequently  it  is  in  large  measure 
a  revival  of  pagan  mysticism  and  of  medieval  magic. 
The  magical  side  we  shall  take  up  in  another  chapter, 
in  treating  of  mental  healing  as  it  degenerated  into  the 
American  form  of  mesmerism.  The  mystical  side  it  is 
almost  impossible  to  portray,  except  as  we  study  by  the 
outward  comparative  methods  the  spread  of  such  a 
symptomatic  movement  as  that  called  Christian  Science. 
The  sources  of  this  system  are  inextricably  confused. 
I  have  elsewhere  pointed  out  that  it  contains  a  portion 


44  EARLY  IDEALISM 

of  the  doctrine  of  the  Yankee  mesmeric  "  healer," 
Quimby  of  Maine;  a  portion  of  the  doctrines  of  the 
Shaker  prophetess,  Mother  Ann  Lee  of  New  Hampshire ; 
a  portion  of  the  orphic  sayings  of  the  transcendental 
rhapsodist,  Bronson  Alcott.  But  such  dissection  does 
not  explain  the  vitality  of  the  movement.  For  an  ex- 
planation we  must  have  recourse  to  the  comparison  of 
the  statistics  of  the  sect  with  conditions  in  various  parts 
of  the  country.  The  statistics  are  to  be  found  in  the 
last  federal  census;  the  conditions  are  suggested  by  an 
interesting,  but  as  yet  unpublished  map  designating 
the  absolute  number  of  Christian  Scientists  in  the  land. 
A  first  glance  at  the  map  shows  this  threefold  dis- 
tribution of  the  sect:  the  East,  the  Middle  "West,  the 
Far  "West.  By  States  this  means  Massachusetts  and 
New  York;  Illinois  and  Missouri;  Colorado  and  Cali- 
fornia. This  confirms  the  official  statement  that  the 
influence  is  strong  over  comparatively  limited  areas  in 
the  United  States.  In  this  threefold  distribution  the 
pathological  factor  is  primarily  in  evidence,  for  the 
centers  of  influence  are  large  cities,  with  their  concomi- 
tant nervous  disorders,  and  the  health  resorts  of  the 
mountains  and  coast,  where  it  is  natural  that  groups  of 
invalids  and  semi-invalids  should  welcome  any  new 
therapeutic  agency.  But  besides  the  physical  there  is 
a  mental  factor  at  work,  besides  "  Health,"  there  is 
"  Science,"  and  for  the  acceptance  of  the  proffered 
metaphysics  there  are  deeper  and  more  subtle  influences 
to  be  considered.  The  new  gospel  of  mental  medicine 
is  also  a  system  of  philosophy.  "  Hopelessly  original," 
as  Mrs.  Eddy  calls  it,  the  system  appeals  to  those  who 
are  inclined  to  novelties.  Tired  of  the  dry  doctrines 
of  the  churches,  to  most  beginners  in  speculation,  un- 
acquainted with  the  history  of  the  schools,  Christian 


MYSTICISM  45 

Science  has  all  the  air  of  discovery.  Now  such  persons, 
who  have,  at  the  least,  the  merit  of  thinking  for  them- 
selves, are  found  chiefly  in  cities,  and  the  acknowledged 
preponderance  of  urban  over  rural  adherents  is  ex- 
plained by  a  third  factor,  that  of  free-thinking  or  a 
liberal  attitude  toward  the  unconventional.  In  the 
little  town  it  is  notoriously  difficult  to  break  from  the 
dogma  of  local  churches ;  it  does  not  approve  of  changes 
in  ecclesiastical  caste.  Free-thinking  is,  therefore,  a 
second  potent  factor  in  the  spread  of  Christian  Science. 
The  map  of  distribution  by  States  discloses  this.  Con- 
necticut and  New  Jersey,  with  conservative  colleges  like 
Yale  and  Princeton,  are  far  below  the  average  of  their 
more  liberal  neighbors.  It  is  not  so  in  Massachusetts, 
that  hotbed  of  heresies ;  nor  in  Illinois,  with  its  mixture 
of  foreign  faiths ;  nor  in  Colorado,  early  home  of  woman 
suffrage;  nor  lastly  in  California,  pervaded  with 
esoteric  Buddhism  and  the  doctrine  of  Maya, — of  the 
world  of  sense  as  shadow  and  illusion. 

A  third  factor  is  financial.  Christian  Science  has 
spread  largely  along  the  fortieth  degree  of  latitude, — 
the  richest  pay-streak  in  our  civilization.  From  their 
personal  appearance  and  from  the  showiness  of  their 
churches  the  followers  of  "  scientific  mental  thera- 
peutics "  are  manifestly  prosperous.  Yet  with  this  very 
physical  prosperity  there  goes  a  spiritual  change.  As 
in  the  case  of  those  primitive  Christian  Scientists,  the 
followers  of  Plotinus  who  centered  in  rich  cities  like 
Alexandria  and  Rome,  so  these  modern  Neo-Platonists 
tend  to  revolt  against  over-prosperity.  "With  a  plethora 
of  wealth  thc}^  incline  toward  asceticism,  and  long  for  a 
breath  of  the  upper  airs  of  mysticism.  In  a  word,  too 
much  of  the  material  has  brought  a  desire  for  the 
immaterial. 


46  EARLY  IDEALISM 

This  introduces  a  fourth  factor  in  the  distribution  of 
the  sect,  for  Christian  Science  as  immaterialism  has 
had,  as  a  prepared  soil,  the  previous  American  idealisms. 
If  a  mental  isothermal  line  could  be  drawn  for  such  a 
phenomenon,  it  would  begin  in  Massachusetts,  stretch 
to  that  historic  projection  of  New  England — the  West- 
ern Reserve — and  continue  on  with  the  latter 's  pro- 
longation into  Illinois.  This,  it  should  likewise  be  noted, 
was  the  path  of  Puritanism;  westward  the  course  of 
Calvinism  took  its  way,  and  on  this  same  path,  seeking 
his  audiences  among  those  of  New  England  stock, 
Emerson  brought  to  the  winners  of  the  West  the  message 
that  ^'  the  spiritual  principle  should  be  suffered  to 
demonstrate  itself  to  the  end." 

Still  another  form  of  transcendentalism,  not  native 
but  foreign,  came  into  this  region.  The  St.  Louis  school 
of  German  idealism,  brought  in  by  the  refugees  of  the 
revolution  of  '48,  worked  its  way  up  the  Missouri  and 
Mississippi  and  found  a  congenial  soil  in  such  Teuton- 
ized  towns  as  Cincinnati  and  Chicago.  Consequently, 
if  one  were  to  compare  our  given  map  with  a  philosophic 
map  designating  the  areas  of  the  early  speculative 
movements  in  the  country,  this  comparison  would  show 
that  the  preparation  for  the  spreading  of  Christian 
Science  was  both  positive  and  negative.  Thus,  where 
immaterialism  was  rife,  it  has  followed;  where  ma- 
terialism flourished,  it  has  gained  little  ground.  The 
former  fact  has  already  been  pointed  out.  Christian 
Science  has  run  along  the  old  grooves  of  New  England 
transcendentalism,  just  as  the  latter  ran  along  those  of 
the  older  English  Puritanism.  Now,  that  the  North 
has  been  continuously  idealistic  we  know;  but  we  are 
not  so  familiar  with  the  fact  that  the  South  has  been 
the  opposite  in  its  speculative  spirit.     Indeed,  in  the 


MYSTICISM  47 

generation  before  Emerson,  there  was  a  flourishing 
school  of  materialists  down  the  Atlantic  coast.  Radiat- 
ing from  the  Philadelphia  Medical  School  that  influence 
spread  chiefl}^  below  Miison  and  Dixon's  line.  This 
would  go  to  explain  the  peculiarity  that  Christian 
Science  has  found  its  line  of  least  resistance  north  of 
that  parallel  and  its  line  of  greatest  resistance  south 
of  it. 

How  far  there  are  deeper  underlying  causes  for  this 
complex  result  it  would  be  hard  to  say.  Lacking  as  yet 
an  adequate  map  of  the  distribution  of  races  in  our 
land,  we  cannot  state,  with  precision,  to  what  extent 
idealism  and  materialism  follow  the  paths  of  racial  dis- 
tribution. But  this,  at  least,  is  of  significance, — that 
our  Northern  idealism  has  been  Anglo-American,  our 
Southern  materialism  Franco-American.  In  the  North 
the  philosophic  succession  has  been  through  Emerson 
and  Edwards  back  to  the  English  Platonists  like  Cud- 
worth,  Norris,  and  More.  In  the  South  that  succession 
has  been  through  Jefferson  and  Franklin  back  to  the 
Gallic  materialists  like  the  authors  of  the  System  of 
Nature  and  Mail  a  Machine. 

That  these  four  factors  are  valid  may  be  corroborated 
in  a  specific  way.  Take  the  case  of  the  founder  of  the 
"  Church  of  Christ,  Scientist."  First,  as  to  the  patho- 
logical factor.  Mary  Baker  Glover's  prime  search  was 
for  health ;  after  her  first  marriage  in  1843  she  tried  in 
turn  allopathy,  homeopathy,  hydropathy,  electricity, 
spiritualism,  and  mesmerism.  Next,  free-thinking  af- 
fected her;  like  the  more  prominent  New  England  re- 
ligionists she  revolted  against  current  Calvinism;  "  the 
horrible  decree  of  predestination,"  she  saj's,  was  ap- 
proached only  to  be  abhorred.  The  third  factor  applies 
in  only  an  indirect  way.     The  invalid  was  of  necessity 


48  EARLY  IDEALISM 

forced  into  painful  ascetic  practices.  But  the  fourth 
factor,  the  search  for  an  immaterial  first  principle,  was 
one  which  has  worked  with  especial  strength  on  the 
discoverer  of  ' '  divine  science. ' '  The  story  of  the  inner 
life  of  Mary  Baker  is  the  story  of  a  typical  reaction  to 
current  philosophies.  Negatively,  there  was  a  revolt 
against  materialism;  materia  medica  was  rejected  for 
"  the  higher  attenuations  of  homeopathy  "  and  these 
prepared  the  imagination  for  a  sheer  immaterialism, 
where  mind  was  everything  and  matter  nothing.  Posi- 
tively, there  was  an  acceptance  of  contemporary  ideal- 
ism, for  the  terms,  though  not  the  exactitudes,  of  Emer- 
sonianism are  to  be  found  scattered  through  Eddy  ism. 
The  faithful  will,  of  course,  deny  that  the  penumbra 
of  Concord,  Massachusetts,  reached  to  Concord,  New 
Hampshire,  just  as  they  have  denied  that  Science  and 
Health  is  an  adumbration  of  the  doctrines  of  the  mag- 
netic healer  Quimby.  Nevertheless  in  both  these  cases 
the  denial  is  not  final.  The  author  has  pointed  out 
elsewhere  how  the  quarrel  between  Eddyites  and 
Quimbyites  can  be  settled  by  recourse  to  the  solution 
of  common  sources, — the  teachings  of  itinerant  animal 
magnetizers  who,  like  their  master  Mesmer,  had  inad- 
vertently hit  on  the  principle  of  suggestive  therapeutics. 
In  like  manner,  the  affiliations  between  Eddyism  and 
transcendentalism  tend  to  throw  new  light  on  the  prob- 
lem of  distribution.  Although  it  is  difficult  to  discover 
any  personal  contact  between  the  frequenters  of  Brook 
Farm  and  Mrs.  Eddy  when  at  Lynn,  except  for  a  flying 
visit  paid  her  by  the  visionary  Bronson  Alcott ;  yet  the 
appeal  to  both  the  academic  transcendentalist  and  the 
New  Hampshire  seeress  was  the  same.  The  earlier 
movement  has  been  described  by  Frothingham  as  having 
its  data  secluded  in  the  recesses  of  consciousness,  out 


MYSTICISM  49 

of  tlie  reach  of  scientific  investigation,  remote  from  tbe 
gaze  of  vulgar  skepticism ;  esoteric,  having  about  them 
the  charm  of  a  sacred  privacy,  on  which  common  sense 
and  the  critical  understanding  might  not  intrude.  Its 
oracles  proceeded  from  a  shrine,  and  were  delivered  by  a 
priest  or  priestess,  who  came  forth  from  an  interior 
holy  of  holies  to  utter  them,  and  thus  were  invested  with 
an  air  of  authority  which  belongs  to  exclusive  and 
privileged  truths,  that  revealed  themselves  to  minds  of 
a  contemplative  cast.  To  the  pure  transcendentalist  the 
soul,  when  awakened,  utters  oracles  of  wisdom,  proph- 
esies, discourses  grandly  of  God  and  divine  things,  per- 
forms wonders  of  healing  on  sick  bodies  and  wandering 
minds.  This  form  of  transcendentalism  was  decried  by 
Emerson  as  the  Saturnalia  or  excess  of  faith,  lacking 
the  restraining  grace  of  common  sense.  In  the  case  of 
Mrs.  Eddy  this  extreme  mysticism  took  the  following 
form.  As  she  wrote  to  one  of  the  directors  of  her 
church:  "  I  possess  a  spiritual  sense.  ...  I  can  dis- 
cern in  the  human  mind,  thoughts,  motives,  and  pur- 
pose; and  neither  mental  arguments  nor  psj'chic  power 
can  affect  this  spiritual  insight.  .  .  .  This  mind  reading 
is  first  sight ;  it  is  the  gift  of  God.  ...  It  has  enabled 
me  to  heal  in  a  marvelous  manner,  to  be  just  in  judg- 
ment, to  learn  the  divine  Mind." 

It  would  be  interesting  to  hunt  for  the  sources  of 
these  claims,  for,  if  Eddyism  be  considered  an  after- 
clap  of  transcendentalism,  a  common  ancestry  can  be 
traced  through  a  series  of  intermediate  links  back  to 
Neo-Platonism.  At  the  least  we  can  make  a  brief  com- 
parison between  the  old  and  new  ways  of  thinking.  The 
old  made  the  possibility  of  knowledge  dependent  on 
divine  communications,  the  new  claims  that  "  science  is 
an  emanation  of  eternal  mind,  and  is  alone  able  to  in- 


50  EARLY  IDEALISM 

terprct  truth  aright."  The  old  denied  sensible  existence 
and  strained  for  something  behind  reality;  the  new 
•'  reverses  the  testimony  of  the  physical  senses  and  by 
this  reversal  mortals  arrive  at  the  fundamental  facts 
of  Being."  The  old  had  a  contempt  for  reason  and 
physical  science ;  the  new  ' '  eschews  what  is  called  phys- 
ical science,  inasmuch  as  all  true  science  proceeds  from 
divine  Intelligence."  The  old  destroyed  the  distinction 
between  sensible  and  intelligible,  the  new  says,  ' '  matter 
is  but  a  subjective  state  of  what  is  here  termed  mortal 
mind." 

This  recrudescence  of  Neo-Platonism  in  the  New 
World  is  not  surprising.  Like  causes  have  produced 
like  effects,  materialism  has  been  followed  by  imma- 
terialism,  one  mood  being  a  natural  recoil  from  the 
other.  One  outburst  of  mystic  idealism  occurred  in 
New  England  a  generation  ago,  for  as  Margaret  Fuller 
explains  of  her  contemporaries,  it  is  *'  because  Ameri- 
cans are  disgusted  with  the  materialistic  workings  of 
rational  religion  that  they  become  mystics ;  they  quarrel 
with  all  that  is,  because  it  is  not  spiritual  enough,  since 
they  acknowledge  in  the  nature  of  man  an  arbiter  for 
his  deeds,  a  standard  transcending  sense  and  time."  At 
the  present  day,  after  the  struggles  of  the  Civil  War  and 
after  the  commercial  expansion  of  the  country,  the  same 
phenomenon  is  recurring  under  the  form  of  the  so-called 
New  Thought.  It  would  be  going  too  far  afield  to  at- 
tempt to  explain  the  significance  of  the  latter  move- 
ment,— its  occultism  or  love  of  the  mysterious,  its 
gnosticism  or  claim  to  peculiar  knowledge,  its  affiliations 
with  previous  mystical  systems, — but  we  can  at  least 
point  out  that  Christian  Science  is  but  a  single  phase  of 
a  larger  interest  which  ranges  from  the  teachings  of 
William  James  to  the  allegories  of  Maeterlinck. 


MYSTICISM  51 

"We  may  here  examine,  in  conclusion,  a  final  factor  in 
the  spread  of  the  sect,  namely  the  type  of  mind  to  which 
it  appeals.  In  general  that  type  is  practical  and  yet 
uncritical,  non-academic  and  yet  speculative.  Although 
the  great  mass  of  Christian  Scientists  consists  of  women 
who  stand  for  the  unrest  of  the  new  feminism,  yet 
that  given  type  is  well  represented  by  imaginative 
business  men  without  a  college  training,  such  as  are 
to  be  found  in  large  cities,  and  such  as  predominate  in 
the  present  directorate  of  the  church.  To  carry  out  the 
analysis  of  the  individual :  in  the  first  place  such  a  man 
is  practical,  he  wants  results.  When  he  sees  benefits 
conferred  upon  his  immediate  circle  he  is  led  to  specu- 
late as  to  the  cause.  Here,  he  says  to  himself,  is  the 
movement,  and  here  is  the  result,  therefore  the  "  demon- 
stration "  or  the  "  absent  treatment  "  must  be  the  con- 
necting link.  Now,  this  is  the  non-academic  way  of 
thinking.  It  belongs  to  that  class  of  persons  who  are 
capable  of  framing  a  syllogism,  but  not  capable  of  dis- 
covering its  fallacious  forms.  To  the  academic  or 
college-bred  type  "  demonstration,"  "  absent  treat- 
ment "  are  as  much  matters  of  dubiety  as  "  mental 
telepathy  "  or  "  wireless  mental  messages."  Now  the 
veriest  undergraduate  is  taught  the  distinction  between 
mind  and  matter,  and  is  taught  to  keep  the  two  spheres 
apart.  Not  so  the  business  man.  To  draw  such  dis- 
tinctions is  not  in  his  line.  Consequently,  although  he 
is  a  "  practical  "  man,  he  will  occasionally  take  a 
"flier"  in  a  scheme  that  savors  of  alchemy,  where 
secret  formula?  are  claimed  to  transmute  metals,  and, 
although  a  "  self-made  "  man,  he  is  often  in  fear  of 
being  overreached  by  some  rival  with  more  "  magnet- 
ism," as  if  the  latter  possessed  some  sort  of  irresistible 
psychic  effluence. 


52  EARLY  IDEALISM 

And  thus  arises  the  failure  to  perceive  the  funda- 
mental fallacy  of  Christian  Science;  that,  while  it  dis- 
claims materialism,  it  still  reeks  with  materialistic 
terms.  Even  a  recent  edition  of  Science  and  Health, 
in  spite  of  its  countless  recensions  from  the  original 
Eddyite  edition,  contains  such  rubrics  as  "  Mental 
Offshoots  "  and  ''  Gravitation  Godward."  It  also 
contains  phrases  of  this  sort:  "  Astronomical  order 
imitates  the  action  of  Divine  Principle  " ;  "  Mind,  God, 
sends  forth  the  aroma  of  Spirit,  the  atmosphere  of  In- 
telligence ";  "If  the  individuals  have  passed  away, 
their  aroma  of  thought  is  left  which  is  mentally  scented 
and  described.  Mind  has  senses  sharper  than  the  body  ' ' ; 
"  Mental  chemicalization,  which  has  brought  conjugal 
infidelity  to  the  surface,  will  assuredly  throw  off  this 
evil,  and  marriage  will  become  purer  when  the  scum  is 
gone." 

This  fatal  flaw,  this  failure  to  distinguish  between 
mental  and  physical,  is  not  recognized  by  the  ordinary 
"  Scientist,"  hence  the  ease  with  which  strange  doc- 
trines can  be  accepted.  Christian  Scientists  deny  the 
existence  of  the  material,  yet  are  reinforced  in  their 
beliefs  by  the  latest  physical  discoveries.  Just  as  Mes- 
merism was  helped  by  "  Franklinism,"  the  theory  of 
psychic  emanations  by  the  fluid  theory  of  electricity,  so 
"  absent  treatment  "  and  silent  "  demonstration  "  are 
bolstered  up  by  appeals  to  Hertzian  waves.  X-rays,  and 
the  like. 

In  fine,  Christian  Science  is  liable  to  spread  wherever 
fundamental  distinctions  fail  to  be  made.  Ignorant, 
then,  of  the  real  procedure  of  suggestive  therapeutics,  a 
procedure  which  has  been  confessedly  neglected  in  our 
medical  profession ;  ignorant  also  of  such  historic  ap- 
proaches to  Science  arid  Health  as  have  been  made  by 


MYSTICISM  53 

the  classic  mystic  manuals  from  those  of  the  Neo- 
Platonists  to  those  of  the  Quakers,  it  is  no  wonder 
that,  in  the  present  state  of  American  culture,  Chris- 
tian Science  spreads  where  there  is  a  "  struggle  for  the 
recovery  of  invalids,"  and  where  there  is  a  "  yearning 
of  the  human  race  for  spirituality. ' ' 


CHAPTER  III 
DEISM 

1.   The  English  Influences 

In  deism  as  a  movement  toward  free-thought  we  have 
a  typical  example  of  English  influence  upon  the  Ameri- 
can mind.  It  was  a  case  of  make  haste  slowly,  for  it  was 
only  by  gradual  degrees  that  British  subjects  emerged 
from  the  apologetic  to  the  constructive,  and  from  the 
constructive  to  the  destructive  type  of  free-thinking. 
The  term  free-thinker,  as  it  first  appeared  in  English 
philosophical  literature,  meant  simply  one  whose  thought 
is  freed  from  the  trammels  of  authority,  who  sought  a 
characteristic  Anglo-Saxon  compromise  between  the 
Bible  and  the  church  on  one  side,  and  reason  on  the 
other.  This  w^as  reflected  in  such  works  as  Christian- 
ity Not  Mysterious  and  Christianity  as  Old  as  the  Crea- 
tion. 

Such  an  attitude  was  too  vague,  too  apologetic.  So  it 
was  succeeded  by  one  more  positive,  more  constructive. 
This  attitude  was  reflected  in  a  search  for  a  natural  or 
universal  religion,  a  platform  of  belief  on  which  all  good 
men  could  unite.  Such  were  the  so-called  five  points 
common  to  all  religions,  which  began  with  the  existence 
of  a  Supreme  Being  and  ended  with  future  rewards  and 
punishments.  But  constructive  deism  was,  in  turn,  suc- 
ceeded by  destructive.  This  began  when  natural  religion 
was  made  to  supplant  revealed,  when  prophecies  were 
eliminated,  when  miracles  were  considered  not  as  props 

64 


THE  ENGLISH  INFLUENCES  55 

to  belief  but  as  mere  myths.  These  three  phases  of 
English  deism  were  exhibited  in  the  colonies.  The 
apologetic  is  represented  by  Cotton  IMather  in  his 
Christian  Philosopher,  or  A  Collection  of  the  Best 
Discoveries  in  Nature  With  Religious  Improvements. 
The  moderate  is  represented  by  Benjamin  Franklin,  . 
who,  with  judicious  vagueness,  offered  as  his  creed  those 
old  points  common  to  all  religions.  The  destructive  is 
represented  by  Thomas  Paine,  who,  in  his  Age  of 
Beason,  argues  boldly  against  mysterj^  and  miracle. 
Deism,  according  to  him,  declares  to  intelligent  man  the 
existence  of  one  Perfect  God,  Creator  and  Preserver 
of  the  Universe;  that  the  laws  by  which  he  governs  the 
world  are  like  himself  immutable ;  and  that  violation  of 
these  laws,  or  miraculous  interference  in  the  movements 
of  nature  must  be  necessarily  excluded  from  the  grand 
system  of  universal  existence. 

American  deism  began  in  a  reaction  against  Puritan 
determinism.  The  belief  in  a  deity  separate  from  the 
world,  an  idle  spectator,  an  absentee  landlord,  was  a 
logical  rebound  from  the  belief  in  a  deity  constantly 
interfering  with  the  world,  a  magical  intervener,  a 
local  busybody.  Thomas  Paine 's  Age  of  Reason,  with 
its  notion  of  a  creator  whose  "  arm  wound  up  the 
vast  machine  "  and  then  left  it  to  run  by  itself,  formed 
a  kind  of  counterpoise  to  Cotton  IMather's  Magnalia 
Christi  Americana,  with  its  faithful  record  of  many 
illustrious,  wonderful  providences,  both  of  mercies  and 
judgments,  on  divers  persons  in  New  England.  In  a 
way,  also,  these  two  books  marked  the  transition  between 
two  different  political  points  of  view,  one  standing  for 
class  favoritism,  the  other  for  the  natural  rights  of 
man.  The  Calvinistic  doctrines  of  sovereign  grace  and 
an  elect  people  savored  too  much  of  tlio  claims  of  British 


56  DEISM 

supremacy  to  be  long  acceptable.  Hence  the  five  points 
of  Calvinism  became  so  many  points  of  irritation. 
Total  depravity  might  apply  to  effete  monarchies, 
but  not  to  the  New  World ;  absolute  predestination  to  the 
land  of  passive  obedience,  but  not  to  the  land  where  men 
sought  to  be  free. 

Calvinism  as  a  doctrine  of  necessity  was,  then,  the 
proximate  cause  of  deism  as  a  doctrine  of  freedom. 
The  notion  of  a  partial  and  arbitrary  deity  prepared 
for  the  religion  of  humanity;  the  system  of  inscrutable 
decrees  for  a  religion  of  reason.  The  change  was  strik- 
ing. Talk  about  creatures  infinitely  sinful  and  abom- 
inable, wallowing  like  swine  in  the  mire  of  their  sins, 
brought  about  a  reaction,  and  the  next  generation  went 
from  the  extreme  of  Puritanic  pessimism  to  the  ex- 
treme of  deistic  optimism,  the  belief  in  the  perfectibility 
of  the  human  race.  This  change  in  sentiment  is  recorded 
in  the  attacks  on  the  old  divinity.  When  the  consistent 
Calvinist  merely  filed  smooth  the  rough  edges  of  a  cast- 
iron  system,  the  forerunners  of  the  Unitarian  movement 
boldly  threw  the  dead  weight  overboard.  To  speak  in 
reproachful  language  of  the  moral  virtues,  comparing 
them  to  filthy  rags,  was  held  absurd ;  while  the  Calvin- 
istic  doctrine  of  the  tendency  of  man's  nature  to  sin, 
as  implying  his  utter  and  eternal  ruin  and  the  tor- 
ments of  hell  fire,  was  declared  shocking  to  the  human 
mind  and  contradictory  to  all  the  natural  notions  both 
of  justice  and  benevolence. 

These  protests  against  determinism  were  character- 
istic of  early  American  deism;  but  behind  these  acute 
personal  reactions  there  were  larger  and  quieter  forces 
at  work.  In  a  word  the  dogmas  of  an  unnatural  re- 
ligion were  giving  way  to  the  principles  of  natural 
religion,  and  rationalism  had  at  last  a  chance  to  assert 


COLONIAL  COLLEGES  AND  FREE-THOUGHT     57 

itself.    Here  deism  constituted  the  moving  cause  and  the 
colonial  college  the  vehicle  in  the  transaction. 


2.    The  Colonial  Colleges  and  Free-Thought 

Deism,  as  a  form  of  rationalism,  had  been  hanging 
on  the  skirts  of  Puritanism  during  the  last  quarter  of 
the  seventeenth  century,  but  it  was  not  until  the 
eighteenth  that  it  took  to  an  independent  growth  and 
hastened  the  intellectual  emancipation  of  New  England. 
The  old  Boston  Platform  had  recognized  the  light  of 
nature,  but  more  in  the  way  of  a  forlorn  negation 
than  a  hopeful  aflSrmation.  It  spoke  of  natural  reason 
as  greatly  impaired,  saying  that  man  retained  no  more 
of  the  light  of  reason  than  would  conduce  to  torment- 
ing reflections.  From  these  timid  limitations  there  arose 
the  desire  for  a  change  from  a  gloomy  theology  to  a 
cheering  theodicy,  from  the  doctrine  of  inscrutable 
decrees  to  the  belief  in  rational  purpose  and  benevolent 
design  in  the  universe.  This  change  is  marked  by  two 
such  representative  works  as  ^Mather's  Reasonable 
Religion  and  Chauncy's  Benevolence  of  the  Deity. 

Cotton  Mather  did  not  attain  his  rationalistic  results 
without  some  mental  perturbation.  At  first  his  attitude  ■ 
was  that  of  one  opposed  to  the  use  of  reason.  Thus  he 
uttered  the  warning:  "  Hearken  ye  of  Har^'ard  and 
Yale  College  to  old  Eubulus,  exhorting  you  with  his 
counsel.  In  most  academies  of  this  world  nothing  is 
acquired  but  worldly  wisdom;  the  philosophy  taught  in 
them  is  nothing  but  foolosophy."  After  such  strictures 
as  these  it  is  rather  strange  that  Mather  can  avail  him- 
self of  rational  arguments.  But  this  he  does  in  his 
Christian  Philosophy,  where  he  quotes  with  approval 
the  statement  of  an  English  writer  that  the  divine  reason 


58  DEISM 

runs  like  a  golden  thread  through  the  whole  leaden  mine 
of  brutal  nature.  Applying  this  principle  to  whatever 
he  saw  about  him,  he  exclaims: 

How  charniini?  the  proportion  and  pulchritude  of  the  leaves, 
the  flowers,  the  fruits.  How  peculiar  the  care  which  the  great 
God  of  nature  has  taken  for  the  safety  of  the  seed  and  fruit! 
When  the  vegetable  race  comes  abroad,  what  strange  methods 
of  nature  are  there  to  guard  them  from  inconveniences.  How 
nice  the  provision  of  nature  for  their  support  in  standing  and 
growing,  that  they  may  keep  their  heads  above  ground  and 
administer  to  our  intentions ;  some  stand  by  their  ow'n  strength, 
others  are  of  an  elastic  nature,  that  they  may  dodge  the  violence 
of  the  winds:  a  visible  argument  that  the  plastic  capacities  of 
matter  are  governed  by  an  all-wise  infinite  agent.  Oh!  the 
glorious  goodness  of  our  deity  in  all  these  things! 

There  was  a  note  in  this  little  book  that  did  not  die. 
While  its  scientific  arguments  for  design  fell  flat,  its 
esthetic  elements  lived  on ;  it  anticipated  by  a  century 
the  transcendentalist's  love  of  nature  for  its  own  sake. 
I\Iather  might  have  said  with  Emerson  "  Come  into  the 
azure  and  love  the  day."  Belonging  to  the  same  school 
of  apologetic  deists  as  Mather  but  of  far  higher  rank 
was  Charles  Chauncy.  In  his  Benevolence  of  the 
Deity,  in  place  of  a  being  cruel,  inscrutable,  acting  by 
particular  providences,  we  find  a  being  benevolent,  ra- 
tional, acting  in  harmony  with  wise  goodness  and  accu- 
rate justice.  The  deity  does  not  communicate  being 
or  happiness  to  his  creatures  by  an  immediate  act  of 
power,  but  by  concurring  with  an  established  course 
of  nature.  He  makes  them  happy  by  the  intervention  of 
second  causes,  operating  in  a  stated,  regular,  uniform 
manner. 

Chauncj-^'s  work  combines  sound  matter  with  a  noble 
style;  it  marked  a  notable  advance  in  the  progress  of 


COLONIAL  COLLEGES  AND  FREE-THOUGHT     59 

rationalism.  To  teach  that  man  is  free  and  not  deter- 
mined ;  active  and  not  passive ;  perfectible  and  not  de- 
praved, was  to  sum  up  the  three  great  tenets  of  deism 
gained  by  way  of  painful  reaction  against  the  harsher 
doctrines  of  Calvinism.  The  way  in  which  this  reaction 
came  about  may  be  traced  more  closely  in  the  later 
writings  of  the  Han-ard  worthies,  who  possessed  one 
notable  means  for  the  public  expression  of  their  views. 
This  was  the  Dudleian  lectureship  founded  for  "  the 
pro^^ng,  explaining,  and  proper  use  and  improvement 
of  the  principles  of  natural  religion."  The  significance 
of  this  lectureship  is  that  it  furnishes  an  historical  cross- 
section  of  the  American  mind.  In  it  may  be  observed 
not  only  the  rise  and  progress  of  deism,  but  also  its 
destruction  through  a  number  of  powerful  solvents.  The 
first  of  the  Dudleian  discourses  furnishes  an  appropri- 
ate introduction  to  the  whole  course  by  giving  an  his- 
torical summary  of  the  problems  of  dualism  as  con- 
nected with  cosmology.  Here  President  Edward  Hol- 
yoke  was  the  initial  speaker: 

There  were  three  opinions  as  to  the  existence  of  the  world. 
One  was  that  it  was  from  Eternity,  &  Plato  it  seems,  was  the 
Father  of  it,  and  thoui^ht  it  flowed  from  God  as  Raies  do  from 
the  Sun,  where,  by  the  way,  we  may  note.  That  tho'  they  tho't 
the  world  to  be  eternal,  yet  that  it  proceeded  from  God;  his 
Scholar  also,  Aristotle,  propagated  the  same  Notion  &  asserted 
that  the  world,  was  not  generated  so  as  to  begin  to  be  a 
world,  which  before  was  none.  He  supposes  preexistent  & 
eternal  flatter  as  a  Principle  and  thence  argn'd  the  world  to 
be  eternal.  .  .  .  Another  Opinion  as  to  the  Existence  of  the 
world,  was  that  it  came  into  this  beautiful  Form,  by  Chance, 
or  a  fortuitous  concourse  &  jumble  of  Atoms,  This  is  bj'  all 
known  to  be  the  Pliilosophy  of  Epicurus,  &  his  Notion  was, 
that  the  LTniverse  consisted  of  Atoms  or  Corpuscles  of  various 
Forms  &  Weights,  which  having  been  dispei-s'd  at  Random  thro' 


60  DEISM 

the  immense  Space,  fortuitously  concur'd,  into  innumerable 
Systems  or  Worlds,  which  were  thus  formed,  &  afterward  from 
time  to  time  increased,  changing  &  dissolving  again  without 
any  certain.  Cause  or  Design,  without  the  Intervention  of  any 
Deity,  or  the  intention  of  any  Providence.  And  yet  this  Phi- 
losopher did  not  deny  the  Existence  of  a  God,  but  on  the  Con- 
trary asserted  it,  but  tho't  it  beneath  the  Majesty  of  the  Deity 
to  concern  himself  with  humane  affairs.  .  .  .  But  the  most 
prevailing  Opinion  .  .  .  was.  That  the  world  had  a  beginning, 
&  was  form'd  by  some  great  and  excellent  Being  whom  they 
called  God.  And  this  indeed  is  a  tho't  that  is  perfectly  agree- 
able to  Reason. 

The  first  Dudleian  lecturer  granted  that  natural  re- 
ligion was  not  unreasonable.  A  certain  successor  twenty 
years  after  argued  for  what  he  calls  a  coincidence  of 
natural  and  revealed  religion.  He  presents  his  argu- 
ments in  a  sort  of  imaginary  conversation : 

Reason  would  say :  "  Surely  this  stupendous  universe  is  the 
work  of  some  invisible  agent,  beyond  all  comparison  &  con- 
ception superiour  to  man ;  for  such  a  grand  complete  System 
so  infinitely  complicate,  &  yet  so  exactly  adjusted  in  all  its 
parts,  the  most  minute  as  well  as  the  grandest,  that  all  kinds 
of  symmetry  and  perfection  concur  to  complete  the  whole, 
could  never  be  the  effect  of  chance  or  the  product  of  endless 
essays  &  mutations  of  matter.  This  Agent  must  have  an  un- 
limited mind,  to  comprehend  these  vast  innumerable  works  in 
one  perfect  Idea,  before  they  were  made.  His  power  also 
must  be  equal  to  his  unlimited  understanding.  And  he  is 
evidently  as  good  as  he  is  wise  and  powerful;  otherwise 
malignity  against  his  creatures  would  appear  in  universal 
discords  through  nature,  perpetually  generating  all  manners 
of  evil.  ...  In  some  such  manner  as  this  Reason  in  its  perfect 
state  might  be  supposed  capable  of  arriving  at  the  knowledge 
of  the  One  True  God,  &  deducing  from  thence  a  compleat 
system  of  natural  religion.  Yet  it  can  hardly  be  conceived, 
according  to  our  experience  of  the  labour  of  searching  out 
truth,  that  the  human  mind,  in  its  utmost  stx^ength,  could  by 


COLONIAL  COLLEGES  AND  FREE-THOUGHT     61 

one  glance  of  thought  discover  all  the  essential  characteristics 
of  the  Deity,  or  the  proper  acts  of  worship  &  obedience  which 
he  requires.  We  might  as  well  affirm,  that  unimpaired  reason 
must  naturally,  at  the  first  view  of  the  heavenly  bodies,  have 
a  clear  knowledge  of  their  magnitudes,  distances  and  revolu- 
tions: or  by  looking  round  on  the  earth,  immediately  be 
acquainted  with  the  innumerable  gradations  of  animal  life,  & 
vegetable  productions  &  fossils  of  all  forms  &  kinds.  .  .  . 
Therefore  it  may  be  justly  questioned  whether  it  would  not 
have  cost  the  labour  of  Ages  to  demonstrate  a  true  System 
of  religion,  as  it  has  taken  nearly  six  thousand  years  to  search 
out  the  laws  of  the  material  system  &  bring  natural  philosophy 
to  its  present  perfection." 

The  arguments  just  presented  were  delivered  in  the 
year  before  the  Declaration  of  Independence.  It  was 
not  until  after  the  second  war  with  England  that  the 
Dudleian  lectures  show  the  weakening  of  the  old  con- 
servative scheme  under  the  assaults  of  the  destructive 
deists.  But  it  remained  for  a  lecturer  of  the  year  be- 
fore the  publication  of  Emerson's  Nature  to  recog- 
nize the  drift  of  a  priori  arguments  for  natural 
religion  as  leading  to  the  self-sufficiency  of  nature. 
Abstract  arguments,  reasons  John  Brazer  in  1835,  are 
objectionable  because  they  virtually  assume  the  point  to 
be  proved.  Thus,  the  axiom  that  every  effect  has  a 
cause  avails  little  with  those  who  deny  that  the  universe 
is  an  effect;  the  axiom  that  whatever  begins  to  exist 
must  have  had  a  cause  of  its  existence,  will  have  no 
pertinency  with  those  who,  like  the  ancient  and  modem 
Epicureans,  assert  that  the  universe  is  eternal  and  the 
creative  power,  whatever  it  be,  only  plastic.  Again,  the 
statement  that  every  contrivance  must  have  a  contriver 
is  no  argument  to  him  who  denies  that  there  is  any  proof 
of  contrivance  further  than  the  particular  instance  in 
question  is  concerned,  as  did  Hume.    Finally,  the  prin- 


62  DEISM 

ciple  that  nothing  can  be  a  cause  of  its  own  existence 
will  conclude  little  against  him  who  asserts  that  the 
world  is  an  exception  to  this  general  rule, — it  being  self- 
existent,  as  Spinoza  maintained. 

We  have  here  at  Harvard  an  hypothetical  approach 
to  pantheism.  In  this  free-thought  had  achieved  a  vic- 
toiy  over  the  old  dualism.  Instead  of  a  creator  and 
creation  separated  by  a  gap  which  could  not  be  bridged, 
instead  of  the  old  doctrine  of  transcendence  with  which 
the  apologetic  deist  had  begun,  we  have  now  the  doctrine 
of  immanence, — the  very  affirmation  of  Emerson  that 
nature,  comprehending  all  existence,  may  be  its  own 
cause. 

The  rise  of  deism  in  the  second  oldest  of  the  New 
England  colleges  is  much  like  that  in  the  first.  At 
Harvard  deism  as  a  movement  of  enlightenment  de- 
veloped through  opposition.  Cotton  Mather,  w4th  his 
eye  upon  the  free-thinkers,  had  declared  that  "  to  ques- 
tion the  being  of  God  would  be  exalted  folly."  Similar 
academic  attempts  to  stem  the  tide  of  rationalism  were 
early  made  at  Yale.  In  spite  of  them  the  freshening 
currents  came  stealing  in.  At  New  Haven,  as  at  New 
Cambridge,  the  heads  of  the  college  could  not  escape 
the  eclectic  spirit  of  the  times.  Rector  Thomas  Clap 
avowed  that  the  great  design  of  founding  this  school 
was  to  educate  ministers  ' '  in  our  own  way  ' ' ;  neverthe- 
less, he  based  his  moral  philosophy  on  the  deistic  Wollas- 
ton's  Religion  of  Nature.  But  there  was  another 
head  of  the  Connecticut  college  who  more  clearlj^  showed 
the  pervasive  influence  of  English  thought  combined 
with  the  mental  independence  of  a  young  colonial.  It 
was  President  Ezra  Stiles,  who  nourished  a  hope  that 
America  might  be  a  land  of  British  liberty  in  the  most 
complete   sense.     As  student   and   tutor  he  had  read 


COLONIAL  COLLEGES  AND  FREE-THOUGHT     63 

through  some  thirty-odd  deistic  works  left  to  the  col- 
lege library  by  Bishop  Berkeley.  These  books  did  much 
to  open  the  eyes  of  their  reader ;  at  the  same  time  they 
did  not  lead  him  into  the  most  radical  skepticism.  He 
recounts  how  he  read  Clarke's  Demonstration  of  the 
Being  and  Attributes  of  God,  but  did  not  find  entire 
satisfaction;  how  he  read  Shaftesbury's  Character- 
istics and  admired  them  as  sublime  views  of  nature 
and  of  the  moral  government  of  the  Most  High.  But 
he  could  not  go  beyond  this  the  Deist's  Bible  and  ac- 
cept the  conclusions  of  the  arch-skeptic  Hume.  Against 
the  latter 's  strictures  upon  the  evidences  of  Christianity 
he  exclaims,  "  Shall  a  King  be  able  by  a  Seal  and  other 
infallible  Signatures  to  evince  his  Proclamations  to 
his  Subjects  so  that  they  shall  have  no  doubt  of  his 
Majesty's  Will:  and  shall  the  Great  Omnipotent  King 
of  the  Universe  be  unable  to  evince  &  ascertain  his  "Will 
to  such  a  handfull  of  Intelligences  the  small  System  of 
Man?  " 

Having  described  the  moral  jaundice  of  the  leader 
of  skepticism  in  old  England,  Stiles  as  Anglus-Ameri- 
canus  turns  to  the  movement  in  New  England  and 
gives  a  vivid  account  of  the  agitations  of  local  thought 
during  the  French  and  Indian  War: 

...  As  we  are  in  the  midst  of  the  struggle  of  Infidelity 
I  expect  no  ^eat  Reformation  until  that  [Revelation]  is 
demonstratively  established.  .  .  .  From  the  Conduct  of  the 
Officers  of  the  Army  you  entertain  an  Expectation  favorable  to 
Virtue.  Far  from  this  I  imagine  the  American  Morals  & 
Religion  were  never  in  so  much  danger  as  from  our  Concern 
with  the  Europeans  in  the  present  War.  They  put  on  indeed 
in  their  public  Conduct  the  Mark  of  public  Virtue — and  the 
Officers  endeavor  to  restrain  the  vices  of  the  private  Soldiery 
while  on  Duty.  But  I  take  it  the  Religion  of  the  Army  is 
Infidelity  &  Gratification  of  the  appetites.  .  .  .  They  propa- 


64  DEISM 

gate  in  a  jrenteel  &  insensible  Manner  the  most  corrupting 
and  debauching  Principles  of  Behavior.  It  is  doubted  by  many 
Officers  if  in  fact  the  Soul  survives  the  Body — but  if  it  does, 
they  ridicule  the  notion  of  moral  accountableness,  Rewards  & 
Punishments  m  another  life.  ...  I  look  upon  it  that  our 
Officers  are  in  danger  of  being  corrupted  with  vicious  prin- 
ciples, &  many  of  them  I  doubt  not  will  in  the  End  of  the 
War  come  home  mmute  philosophers  initiated  in  the  polite 
Mysteries  &  vitiated  morals  of  Deism,  And  this  will  have  an 
unhappy  Effect  on  a  sudden  to  spread  Deism  or  at  least  Scepti- 
cism thro'  these  Colonies.  And  I  make  no  doubt,  instead  of 
the  Controversies  of  Orthodoxy  &  Heresy,  we  shall  soon  be 
called  to  the  defence  of  the  Gospel  itself.  At  Home  the 
general  grand  Dispute  is  on  the  Evidences  of  Revelation — ■ 
some  few  of  your  small  Folks  indeed  keep  warming  up  the  old 
Pye,  &  crying  Calvinism,  Orthodoxy  &c — these  are  your 
Whitefields,  Romaines,  &c  that  make  a  pother:  but  the  greater 
Geniuses  among  the  Ministers  are  ranging  the  Evidences  of 
Revelation  to  the  public  View,  expunging  the  Augustine  In- 
terpretations of  Scripture  with  the  other  Corruptions  of  the 
Latin  Chh,  yet  retained  among  protestants — and  endeavoring 
a  just  &  unexceptionable,  rational  Explication  of  the  great 
Doctrines  of  the  Gospel.  The  Bellamys  &c  of  New  England 
will  stand  no  Chance  with  the  Corruptions  of  Deism  which,  I 
take  it,  are  spreading  apace  in  this  Connfx-y.  i  prophesy 
your  Two  Witnesses  will  avail  more  towards  curing  the  Con- 
tagion than  thousands  of  Volumes  filled  with  cant  orthodox 
phrases  &  the  unintelligible  Metaphysics  of  Scholastic  Divinity, 
which  is  a  Corruption  of  Christianity  with  arabian  philosophy. 

Yet  Stiles  was  no  such  reactionary  as  some  of  his 
correspondents  thought.  He  did  not  hold  that  the 
overvaluing  of  reason  tends  to  promote  atheism.  When 
he  was  informed  that  Kector  Clap  would  not  suffer 
a  donation  of  certain  books  from  the  free-thinking 
colony  of  Rhode  Island,  he  wrote  to  the  rigid  Rector  and 
made  a  notable  appeal  for  unrestrained  thought: 

.  .  .  Different  men  indeed  object  from  different  motives, 
some  from  the  Love  of  Orthodoxy  &  some  from  the  Hatred 


COLONIAL  COLLEGES  AND  FREE-THOUGHT     65 

of  it,  &  some  from  the  generous  Sentiments  of  that  generous 
&  equal  Liberty  for  which  Protestants  &  Dissenters  have  made 
so  noble  a  Stand.  It  is  true  with  this  Liberty  Error  may  be 
introduced;  but  turn  the  Tables  the  propagation  of  Truth 
may  be  extinguished.  Deism  has  got  such  Head  in  this  Age 
of  Licentious  Liberty,  that  it  would  be  in  vain  to  try  to  stop  it 
by  hiding  the  Deistieal  Writings:  and  the  only  Way  left  to 
conquer  &  demolish  it,  is  to  come  forth  into  the  open  Field 
&  Dispute  this  matter  on  even  Footing — the  Evidences  of 
Revelation  in  my  opinion  are  nearly  as  demonstrative  as 
Newton's  Prineipia,  &  these  are  the  Weapons  to  be  used. 
Deism  propagates  itself  in  America  very  fast,  &  on  this 
Foundation,  strange  as  it  may  seem,  is  the  Chh  of  Engld  built 
up  in  polite  Life.  A  man  may  be  an  excellent  Chhman  &  yet 
a  profound  Deist.  While  public  pojiular  Delusion  is  kept  up 
by  Deistieal  Priests,  sensible  Laymen  despise  the  whole,  & 
yet,  strange  Contradiction!  joyn  it,  and  entice  others  to  joyn 
it  also. — and  they  say  all  priests  are  alike,  we  all  try  to 
deceive  Mankind,  there  is  no  Ti'ust  to  be  put  in  us.  Truth 
&  this  alone  being  our  Aim  in  fact,  open,  frank  &  generous 
we  shall  avoid  the  very  appearance  of  Evil. 

The  protest  of  Stiles  was  unavailing.  Measures  were 
now  taken  to  stop  the  infiltration  of  any  form  of  deism. 
By  a  vote  of  the  president  and  fellows,  students  were 
to  be  established  in  the  principles  of  religion  according 
to  the  Assembly's  Catechism,  Dr.  Ames's  Medulla,  and 
Cases  of  Conscience.  Yale  was  now  outwardly  a  strong- 
hold of  orthodoxy ;  how  it  came  to  be  called  a  hotbed  of 
infidelity  is  a  matter  of  later  times.  It  was  not  until 
after  the  Revolutionary  War  that  the  satirist  could 
describe  undergraduate  skepticism,  could  tell  how  the 
clockwork  gentleman  was  made  "  twixt  the  Tailor  and 
the  Player,  and  Hume,  and  Tristram  and  Voltaire." 
All  this  might  have  been  expected.  Action  and  re- 
action were  equal.  As  at  Harvard  opposition  had 
brought    electicism,    so    at    Yale    the    policy    of    sup- 


66  DEISM 

pression  brought  an  explosion  of  free-thinking  upon 
the  advent  of  the  Franco-American  deism  of  Citizen 
Paine  and  President  Jefferson. 

Meanwhile  it  is  in  order  to  follow  the  fortunes  of 
deism  outside  of  New  England,  and  to  see  how  the  other 
colonial  colleges  of  the  first  rank  were  laid  open  to  the 
advances  of  rationalism. 

The  first  head  of  King's  College,  New  York,  destined 
to  become  the  future   Columbia   University,   was  that 
Samuel  Johnson  who  had  been  forced  out  of  Yale  be- 
cause of  his  liberal  tendencies,  which  were  early  shown 
even  in  the  reputed  land  of  the  blue  laws.     The  very 
title  of  his  most  juvenile  work,  Raphael,  or  the  Genius  of 
English  America,  was  a  protest  against  colonial  con- 
servatism.   But  Johnson's  actions  spoke  louder  than  his 
words.     As  an  undergraduate  he  was  warned  against 
reading  Descartes,  Locke,  and  Newton  ;  becoming  a  tutor, 
he  introduced  these  works  into  the  college  library.    As  a 
theological  student  he  was  cautioned  against  a  certain 
new  philosophy,  that  of  Berkeley,  which  was  attracting 
attention  in  England,  being  told  that  it  would  corrupt 
the  pure  religion  of  the  country  and  bring  in  another 
system  of  divinity.     The  warning  was  ineffective,  for 
Johnson  became  a  clergyman  in  the  Church  of  England 
and  sought  to  spread  that  very  philosophy  against  which 
he  had  been  warned.     What  trials  met  the  students  in 
the  provincial  seats  of  learning  is  suggested  in  a  recently 
recovered  manuscript  entitled:  The  Travails  of  the  In- 
tellect in  the  Mycrocosm  and  Macrocosm.     In  this  ju- 
venile work  Johnson  leaves  the  little  world  of  Puritan 
thought  and  emerges  into  the  larger  world  of  construct- 
ive deism.    His  scheme  has  as  its  beginning  benevolence, 
and  as  its  end  evidences  of  cosmic  design.    This  scheme 
was  conceived  by  the  author  at  the  age  of  eighteen,  but, 


COLONIAL  COLLEGES  AND  FREE-THOUGHT     67 

being  obliged  to  conceal  his  opinions  with  caution,  it 
was  not  for  half  a  generation  and  through  an  English 
magazine  that  the  young  American  was  enabled  fully  to 
express  his  views. 

To  show  how  judicious  was  the  rationalism  of  this 
Introduction  to  Philosophy  we  may  explain  that  the 
purpose  of  this  small  tract,  "  by  a  gentleman  educated 
at  Yale  College,"  was  declared  to  be:  the  setting  be- 
fore young  gentlemen  a  general  view  of  the  whole  sys- 
tem of  learning  in  miniature,  as  geography  exhibits  a 
general  map  of  the  whole  terraqueous  globe.  As  in  the 
natural  so  in  the  intellectual  world,  young  students 
must  have  a  prospect  of  the  whole  compass  of  their  busi- 
ness and  the  general  end  pursued  through  the  whole. 

We  may  here  cite  the  case  of  another  graduate  of 
Yale,  at  King's  College,  whose  effusions,  though  light 
like  straws,  showed  how  the  wind  was  blowing  in  the 
deistic  direction.  William  Livingston,  in  his  Remarks 
upon  Our  Intended  College,  wished  to  have  the  rules 
free  to  all,  offensive  to  no  sect.  Fighting  the  ett'orts 
of  the  Episcopalians  to  obtain  control  of  the  institution, 
he  was  charged  with  deism  and  atheism.  He  thereupon 
retorted  upon  his  opponents  with  a  travesty  of  the 
Thirty-Nine  Articles,  whose  tenor  may  be  judged  by  the 
following : 

I.  I  believe  the  Scriptures  of  the  Old  and  New  Testa- 
ments, without  any  forei.<rn  comments  or  human  explications 
but  my  own :  for  which  I  should  doubtless  be  honoured  with 
Martyrdom,  did  I  not  live  in  a  government  which  restrains 
that  fiery  zeal,  which  would  reduce  a  man's  body  to  ashes  for 
the  illumination  of  his  soul.  .  .  .  XXXIX.  I  believe  that  this 
creed  is  more  intelligible  than  that  of  St.  Athanasius  and 
that  there  will  be  no  necessity  for  any  to  write  an  exposition 
of  the  Thirty-Nine  Articles  of  my  faith. 


68  DEISM 

The  position  of  King's  College  in  colonial  free-think- 
ing was  significant.  It  was  a  sort  of  half-way  house 
between  the  extreme  piiritanism  of  the  North  and  the 
extreme  deism  of  the  South.  The  former  had  made  God 
eveiy thing:  the  latter  made  man  everything.  Samuel 
Johnson  was  a  mediator  between  these  two  views:  his 
first  book  made  the  happiness  of  mankind  to  be  God's 
chief  end;  his  last  made  the  glory  of  God  not  incon- 
sistent with  our  pursuing  our  own  happiness. 

To  trace  the  further  development  of  deism  in  the 
colonies,  we  pass  over  the  College  of  New  Jersey,  de- 
fender of  the  faith,  opponent  of  rationalism,  and  go  on 
to  Philadelphia  and  Franklin. 

3.   Philadelphia  and  Franklin 

"  I  was  scarce  fifteen,"  narrates  Benjamin  Franklin, 
"  when,  after  doubting  by  turns  of  several  points,  as  I 
found  them  disputed  in  the  different  books  I  read,  I 
began  to  doubt  of  Revelation  itself.  Some  books  against 
Deism  fell  into  my  hands;  they  were  said  to  be  the 
substance  of  sermons  preached  at  Boyle's  Lectures.  It 
happened  that  they  wrought  an  effect  on  me  quite  con- 
trary to  what  was  intended  by  them ;  for  the  arguments 
of  the  Deists,  which  were  quoted  to  be  refuted,  ap- 
peared to  me  much  stronger  than  the  refutation;  in 
short,  I  soon  became  a  thorough  Deist." 

We  have  here  the  confession  of  the  most  precocious  of 
the  American  skeptics.  There  is  added  to  it  an  ex- 
planation which  takes  in,  with  characteristic  inclusive- 
ness,  the  two  factors  of  heredity  and  environment. 
Franklin  explains  that  he  was  a  free-thinker  because  of 
a  free-thinking  ancestor,  and  a  deist  because  of  a  youth- 
ful overdose  of  Calvinism.     Thus  he  relates  how  his 


PHILADELPHIA  AND  FRANKLIN  G9 

matomal  grandfather  had  written  some  homespun 
verse  in  favor  of  liberty  of  conscience,  and  that  his 
father's  little  collection  of  books  consisted  mostly  of 
polemical  works  of  divinity.  Although  Franklin  con- 
sidered that  some  of  the  dogmas  of  the  Presbyterian  per- 
suasion, such  as  the  eternal  decrees  of  God,  election, 
reprobation,  appeared  very  unintelligible  and  others 
doubtful,  yet  he  never  doubted  that  deity  exists;  that 
he  made  the  world  and  governed  it  by  his  providence; 
that  the  most  acceptable  service  of  God  was  the  doing 
good  to  man ;  that  our  souls  are  immortal ;  and  that  all 
crimes  will  be  punished,  and  virtue  rewarded,  either 
here  or  hereafter. 

This  creed  was  nothing  but  Herbert  of  Chcrbury's 
five  points  common  to  all  religions,  the  veritable  creed 
of  a  moderate  deist,  and  yet  Franklin  tells  how  he  was 
obliged  to  leave  Boston  when  his  indiscreet  disputations 
about  religion  began  to  make  him  pointed  at  with  horror 
by  good  people  as  an  infidel  and  atheist.  He  next  re- 
counts how,  being  employed  in  London,  at  the  age  of  nine- 
teen, in  composing  as  printer  for  "Wollaston 's  Religion  of 
Nature  Delineated,  and  some  of  the  author's  reasonings 
not  appearing  well  founded,  he  wrote  a  little  metaphysi- 
cal piece  entitled  A  Dissertation  on  Liberty  and  Neces- 
sity, Pleasure  and  Pain.  The  purport  of  this  essay 
was  to  prove  the  doctrine  of  fate  from  the  supposed 
attributes  of  God,  reasoning  in  some  such  manner  as 
this :  That  in  erecting  and  governing  the  world,  as  he  was 
infinitely  wise,  he  knew  what  would  be  best;  infinitely 
good  he  must  be  disposed,  and  infinitely  powerful,  he 
must  be  able  to  execute  it ;  consequently  all  is  right. 

Franklin  stated  that  the  printing  of  this  "  wicked 
tract  "  of  1725  was  an  "  erratum  "  in  the  book  of  his 
life.     That  confession  was  probably  meant  to  disarm 


70  DEISM 

criticism.  The  deistic  fatalism  of  this  pamphlet  was  as 
nothing  compared  with  the  strange  views  set  forth  three 
years  later  in  his  Articles  of  Belief  and  Acts  of  Re- 
ligion. Drawn  up  among  the  regulations  of  the  Phila- 
delphia Junto  or  club  for  mental  improvement,  this 
document  formed  a  kind  of  shopkeeper's  litany,  or  home- 
service  for  young  mechanics.  Among  its  parts  were  the 
First  Principles,  Adoration  and  Petition,  of  which  the 
last  begged  that  the  petitioner  might  be  preserved  from 
atheism  and  infidelity;  the  second  urged  the  reading 
of  deistic  authors  like  Ray,  Blaekmore,  and  the  Arch- 
bishop of  Cambray;  while  the  first,  as  if  in  conscious 
opposition  to  the  Anglican  creed,  taught  the  doctrine, 
not  of  one  God  without  parts  and  passions,  but  of  many 
gods  endowed  with  human  passions. 
Here,  then,  follow  Franklin's  peculiar 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 

I  believe  there  is  one  supreme,  most  perfect  Being,  Author 
and  Father  of  the  Gods  themselves.  For  I  believe  that  Man 
is  not  the  most  perfect  Being  but  one,  rather  that  as  there 
are  many  Degrees  of  Being-s  his  Inferiors,  so  there  are  many 
Degi'ees  of  Beings  superior  to  him. 

Also,  when  I  stretch  my  imagination  thro'  and  beyond  our 
System  of  Planets,  beyond  the  visible  fixed  Stars  themselves, 
into  that  space  that  is  every  Way  infinite,  and  conceive  it  fill'd 
with  Suns  like  ours,  each  with  a  Chorus  of  Worlds  forever 
moving  round  him,  then  this  little  Ball  on  which  we  move, 
seems,  even  in  my  narrow  Imagination,  to  be  almost  Nothing, 
and  myself  less  than  nothing,  and  of  no  sort  of  Consequence^ 

When  I  think  thus,  I  image  it  great  Vanity  in  me  to  sup- 
pose, that  the  Supremely  Perfect  does  in  the  least  regard  such 
an  inconsidei'able  Nothing  as  Man,  More  especially,  since  it  is 
impossible  for  me  to  have  any  positive  clear  idea  of  that 
which    is    infinite    and    incomprehensible,    I    cannot    conceive 


PHILADELPHIA  AND  FRANKLIN  71 

othenvise  than  that  he  the  Infinite  Father  expects  or  requires 
no  Worship  or  Praise  from  us,  but  that  he  is  even  infinitely 
above  it. 

But,  since  there  is  in  all  Men  something  like  a  natural  prin- 
ciple, which  inclines  them  to  devotion,  or  the  Worship  of 
some  unseen  Power; 

And  since  'Men  are  endued  with  Reason  superior  to  all  other 
Animals,  that  we  are  in  our  World  acquainted  with; 

Therefore  I  think  it  seems  required  of  me,  and  my  Duty  as 
a  Man  to  pay  Divine  Regards  to  Something. 

I  conceive  then,  that  the  Infinite  has  created  many  beings 
or  Gods,  vastly  superior  to  Man,  who  can  better  conceive  his 
Perfections  than  we,  and  return  him  a  more  rational  and 
glorious  Praise. 

As,  among  Men,  the  Praise  of  the  Ignorant  or  of  Children 
is  not  regarded  by  the  ingenious  Painter  or  Architect,  who  is 
rather  honour'd  and  pleas'd  with  the  approbation  of  Wise 
Men  &  Artists. 

It  may  be  that  these  created  Gods  are  immortal;  or  it  may 
be  that  after  many  Ages,  they  are  changed,  and  others  Supply 
their  Places. 

Howbeit,  I  conceive  that  each  of  these  is  exceeding  wise 
and  good,  and  very  powerful;  and  that  Each  has  made  for 
himself  one  glorious  Sun,  attended  with  a  beautiful  and 
admirable  System  of  Planets. 

It  is  that  particular  Wise  and  good  God,  who  is  the  author 
and  owner  of  our  system,  that  I  propose  for  the  object  of 
my  praise  and  adoration. 

For  I  conceive  that  he  has  in  himself  some  of  those  Pas- 
sions he  has  planted  in  us,  and  that,  since  he  has  given  us 
Reason  whereby  we  are  capable  of  observing  his  Wisdom  in 
the  Creation,  he  is  not  above  caring  for  us,  being  pleas'd  with 
our  Praise,  and  offended  when  we  slight  Him,  or  neglect 
his  Glory. 

I  conceive  for  many  Reasons,  that  he  is  a  good  Being;  and 
as  I  should  be  happy  to  have  so  wise,  good,  and  powerful  a 
Being  my  Friend,  let  me  consider  in  what  manner  I  shall 
make  myself  most  acceptable  to  him. 

Next  to  the  Praise  resulting  from  and  due  to  his  Wisdom, 
I  believe  he  is  pleas'd  and  delights  in  the  Happiness  of  those 


I 


72  DEISM 

he  has  created;  and  since  without  Virtue  Man  can  have  no 
Happiness  in  this  World,  I  firmly  believe  he  delights  to  see 
me  Virtuous,  because  he  is  pleas'd  when  he  sees  Me  Happy. 

And  since  he  has  created  many  Things,  which  seem  purely 
design'd  for  the  Delight  of  Man,  I  believe  he  is  not  offended, 
when  he  sees  his  Children  solace  themselves  in  any  manner  of 
pleasant  exercises  and  Innocent  Delights;  and  I  think  no 
Pleasure  innocent  that  is  to  Man  hurtful. 

I  love  him  therefore  for  bis  Goodness,  and  I  adore  him  for 
his  Wisdom. 

Let  me  then  not  fail  to  praise  my  God  continually,  for  it  is 
his  Due;  and  it  is  all  I  can  return  for  his  many  Favours  and 
great  Goodness  to  me;  and  let  me  resolve  to  be  virtuous,  that 
I  may  be  happy,  that  I  may  please  Him,  who  is  delighted  to 
see  me  happy.    Amen ! 

Franklin's  First  Principles  form  an  astonishing  docu- 
ment; they  teach  a  veritable  polytheism  in  a  land 
monotonously  monotheistic.  We  may  postpone  for  a 
moment  the  search  for  the  precise  sources  of  this  doc- 
trine and  give  a  general  reason  for  its  rise.  It  was 
Franklin's  penetrating  gaze  that  saw  the  essential  weak- 
ness of  the  deistie  tenet  of  transcendence.  As  the  God 
of  the  deist  was  removed  farther  and  farther  from  the 
world  he  became  less  and  less  an  object  of  worship.  This 
removal  occurred  in  both  time  and  space.  On  the  one 
hand  the  conventional  date  of  the  creation  was  dis- 
counted; geology  lengthened  Genesis,  and  the  coming 
into  being  of  the  world  was  thrust  into  the  dark  back- 
ward and  abysm  of  time.  The  same  thing  happened  in 
regard  to  space.  The  deity  was  dogmatically  placed 
outside  the  framework  of  the  visible  universe,  but  as  that 
universe  was  enlarged  its  maker  was  necessarily  put  be- 
yond the  uttermost  bounds.  So  by  a  double  process  the 
deity  became  less  an  object  of  woi*ship  than  a  vague 
first  cause  at  an  infinite  remove. 


PHILADELPHIA  AND  FRANKLIN  73 

Franklin's  strange   intermediate   God  was  perfectly 
logical.    ]\Iore  than  that,  his  pluralism  of  divinities  had 
a  reputable  literary  source.     There  was  the  prevalent 
belief  in  a  graded  scale  of  reasoning  life,  as  when  Pope 
sought  to  discover  "  what  varied  being  peoples  ev'ry 
star. ' '    More  particularly,  there  was  the  familiar  scheme 
of  Wollaston,  who  spoke  of  "the  fixed  stars  as  so  many 
suns  with   their  several  sets  of  planets  about  them." 
Finally,  inserted  in  the  midst  of  Franklin's  document, 
there  Avas  the  "  Hymn  to  the  Creator,"  wherein  ]\Iilton 
sang  of  "  Sons  of  light,  angels,  fixed  stars."     But  we 
have   still   more  exact  knowledge  as  to   what  was   at 
the  very  bottom  of  these  peculiar  Articles  of  Belief. 
It  is  known  that  the  original  manuscript  was  Frank- 
lin's daily  companion  to  the  end  of  his  life,  but  it  seems 
to  have  escaped  notice,   for  a  full  century   after  his 
birth,  how  far  he  was  indebted  to  Plato.    Nevertheless 
it  has  been  shown  how  Franklin's  writings  give  evidence 
that  in  his  youth  he  fell  under  the  spell  of  the  ancient 
charmer.     He  tells  how  in  his  sixteenth  or  seventeenth 
year    he    procured    the    Memorabilia.      From    this    he 
adopted  the  Socratie  method  of  dispute,  dropping  abrupt 
contradiction  and  positive  argumentation  and  putting 
on  the  humble  inquirer  and  doubter.     To  Plato,  then, 
we  may  trace  the  polytheism  of  the  Philadelphian.    For 
instance,  the  description,  in  the  First  Principles,  of  the 
Father  of  the  gods  themselves  embodies  the  doctrines  of 
the  Timceus  concerning  the  Father  who  begat  the  world 
and  made  the  eternal  gods,  who  formed  the  universe 
and  assigned  each  soul  to  a  star,  who  was  good,  and  being 
free  from  jealousy,  desired  that  all  things  should  be  as 
like  himself  as  possible. 

Space  is  lacking  in  which  to  reproduce  one  of  Frank- 
lin's delightful  dialogues  in  the  classic  style,  nothing  to 


74  DEISM 

c(|u;il  which  for  charm  and  fancy  had  so  far  appeared  in 
the  colonies.  Space  also  is  lacking  in  which  to  tell 
about  his  ethical  schemes:  his  practical  pocket-book  for 
eradicating  the  vices;  his  Society  of  the  Free  and 
Easy,  "  a  sect  that  should  be  begun  and  spread  at 
first  among  young  and  single  men,  each  one  of  whom 
should  exercise  himself  with  the  thirteen  weeks'  examina- 
tion of  the  thirteen  virtues,  and  only  then  should  the 
existence  of  the  Society  be  made  a  matter  of  public 
knowledge. ' ' 

We  pass,  therefore,  from  Franklin  as  the  virtuous 
Poor  Richard  to  Franklin  as  the  advocate  of  free- 
thought.  Here  we  should  distinguish  between  his  pri- 
vate and  his  public  views.  The  best  portraits  of  Frank- 
lin present  as  their  mark  of  authenticity  a  secretive 
smile  playing  about  his  lips.  This  is  characteristic.  It 
suggests  that  what  he  expressed  outwardly  did  not 
always  obtain  within.  After  his  early  speculative  "  er- 
rata "  he  assumed  a  cautious  attitude  toward  religion 
as  a  public  institution.  Thus  he  writes  to  an  anonymous 
correspondent,  presumably  Thomas  Paine,  that  he  has 
read  his  manuscript  with  some  attention,  but  that  the 
arguments  it  contains  against  the  doctrine  of  a  particu- 
lar providence  strike  at  the  foundation  of  all  religion. 
He  therefore  gives  as  his  opinion,  that  though  the 
author's  reasonings  are  subtle,  and  may  prevail  with 
some  readers,  yet  he  will  not  succeed  so  as  to  change 
the  general  sentiments  of  mankind  on  the  subject,  and 
the  consequence  of  the  printing  of  the  piece  will  be  a 
great  deal  of  odium  drawn  upon  himself,  and  no  benefit 
to  others.  He  that  spits  against  the  wind  spits  in  his 
own  face. 

Of  the  same  nature  as  this  homely  piece  of  advice 
was  Franklin's  Information  to  Those  Who  would  Re- 


PHILADELPHIA  AND  FRANKLIN  75 

7nove  to  America.  Here  he  writes  that,  in  the  New 
World,  religion  under  its  various  denominations  is  not 
only  tolerated,  but  respected  and  practiced.  Atheism 
is  unknown  there  ;  infidelity  rare  and  secret ;  so  that  per- 
sons may  live  to  a  great  age  in  that  country  without  hav- 
ing their  piety  shocked  by  meeting  with  cither  an  atheist 
or  an  infidel.  This  is  a  Jesuitical  generalization,  its 
truth  being  contradicted  by  the  single  fact  that  when 
Franklin  made  a  motion  for  the  holding  of  prayers  in 
the  Constitutional  Convention,  as  a  means  of  correcting 
the  melancholy  imperfections  of  the  human  understand- 
ing, he  added  in  a  satirical  note,  that  the  convention, 
except  for  three  or  four  persons,  held  prayers  to  be 
unnecessary. 

These  are  contradictory  statements,  but  there  was  a 
reason  why  Franklin's  writings  and  private  beliefs  did 
not  hang  together.  The  reason  was  his  utilitarian  point 
of  view:  he  might  consider  free-thinking  as  a  thing 
good  in  itself,  but  like  his  electric  fluid,  it  was  to  be 
guided  and  conducted  into  safe  channels.  In  spite  of 
his  general  attitude  of  caution  there  were  cert-ain  times 
when  he  took  a  firm  stand  against  intellectual  and  re- 
ligious coercion.  This  was  shown  in  the  aid  he  extended 
to  the  radical  Joseph  Priestley,  author  of  the  Corrup- 
tions of  Christianity;  also  in  his  request  to  Cadwallader 
Colden  to  stop  prosecution  of  the  editor  of  the  Nciv  York 
Gazette,  for  publishing  a  defense  of  deism ;  and  finally 
in  his  letter  to  Ezra  Stiles  of  Connecticut,  wherein  he 
reiterates  the  deistic  creed  of  his  youth,  confesses  that 
he  believes  that  primitive  Christianity  has  received  cor- 
rupting changes,  and  concludes  with  the  observation  that 
he  does  not  perceive  that  the  Supreme  takes  it  amiss 
by  distinguishing  the  unlielievers  in  his  government 
of  the  world  with  any  peculiar  marks  of  displeasure. 


76  DEISM 

The  result  of  Franklin 's  liberal  policy  was  that  Phila- 
delphia in  his  day  was  in  the  van  of  intellectual  prog- 
ress. When  John  Adams  sarcastically  observed  that  the 
place  considered  itself  the  pineal  gland  of  the  United 
States,  one  might  have  retorted  that  that  was  true  since 
Franklin  was  the  seat  of  its  intellect.  It  was  due  to  his 
influence  as  founder  that  the  University  of  Pennsylvania 
became  noteworthy  for  requiring  no  religious  test 
of  its  instructors,  and  for  being  so  unprejudiced 
as  to  bestow  an  honorary  degree  even  upon  Thomas 
Paine. 

Forced  to  be  cautious  at  home  it  was  in  France  that 
Franklin  came  out  in  his  true  colors.  On  his  mission  to 
Paris  in  1776  he  showed  a  remarkable  liveliness  of 
spirits  for  a  man  of  seventy.  A  kind  of  Socrates  in  small- 
clothes, he  preserved  to  the  last  the  ancient  irony,  the 
mastery  of  dialogue  he  had  shown  in  his  youthful  es- 
says. Upon  his  arrival,  being  publicly  introduced  to 
Voltaire,  he  was  hailed  as  the  Solon  embracing  the 
Sophocles  of  the  age.  And  Condorcet  made  the  remark- 
able eulogy  which  contains  the  parallel  between  these 
two  men  as  representatives  of  philosophy  rescuing  the 
race  of  man  from  the  tyrant  fanaticism.  What  the  old 
diplomat  was  thought  to  believe  at  this  time  is  told  in 
a  conversation  which  John  Adams  recounts  having  had 
with  De  Marbois,  later  secretary  of  the  French  legation 
in  the  United  States :  ' '  All  religions  are  tolerated  in 
America,"  said  M.  Marbois,  "  and  the  ambassadors  have 
in  all  courts  a  right  to  a  chapel  in  their  own  way;  but 
Mr.  Franklin  never  had  any."    ''No,"  said  I,  laughing, 

"  because  Mr.  Franklin  had  no "     I  was  going  to 

say  what  I  did  not  say,  and  will  not  say  here.  I  stopped 
short  and  laughed.  "No,"  said  M.  Marbois,  "  Mr. 
Franklin  adores  only  great  Nature,  which  has  interested 


VIRGINIA  AND  JEFFERSON  77 

a  great  many  people  of  both  sexes  in  liis  favor." 
"  Yes,"  said  I,  laughing,  "  all  the  atheists,  deists,  and 
libertines,  as  well  as  the  philosophers  and  ladies,  are  in 

his  train, — another  Voltaire,  and  thence "    "  Yes," 

said  ]\I.  Marbois,  '*  he  is  celebrated  as  the  great  philoso- 
pher and  the  great  legislator  of  America." 

4.   Virginia  and  Jefferson 

As  Philadelphia  was  intellectually  dominated  by  Ben- 
jamin Franklin,  so  was  Virginia  by  Thomas  Jefferson. 
How  firmly  the  latter  stood  for  liberty  of  thinking  is 
manifest  in  the  President's  express  desire  to  have  in- 
scribed on  his  tomb:  "  Author  of  the  Declaration  of 
American  Independence,  of  the  Statute  of  Virginia  for 
Religious  Freedom,  and  the  Father  of  the  University  of 
Virginia."  As  the  advocate  of  free-thought  in  the  Old 
Dominion,  Jefferson  was  but  the  embodiment  of  his  class. 
In  contrast  to  the  heresy-hunting  Calvinists  of  the  North, 
he  typified  the  fox-hunting  Arminians  of  the  South.  His 
earliest  intellectual  impressions  were  gained  from  that 
local  species  of  Anglican  clergy  who,  from  reading  the 
fashionable,  skeptical  literature  of  the  mother  country, 
came  to  be  considered  as  lax  in  thought  as  they  were 
reputed  to  be  loose  in  living. 

Besides  the  Cavalier  clergy,  the  College  of  William 
and  Mary  had  marked  influence  on  Jefferson's  mind. 
In  addition  to  the  liberty  of  philosophizing  advocated 
in  its  charter  the  scientific  spirit  prevailed  in  the  place. 
William  Small,  friend  of  Watt,  the  inventor  of  the 
steam  engine,  and  of  Erasmus  Darwin,  the  grandfather 
of  the  evolutionist,  came  to  the  Virginia  institution  in 
1758,  and  Jefferson,  who  attended  his  lectures  in  natural 
philosophy,  declared  that  he  fixed  the  destinies  of  his 


78  DEISM 

life.  Adding  to  these  liberalizing  forces  the  elective 
system  of  studies,  and  the  naturally  volatile  temper  of 
the  Southerner,  it  was  inevitable  that  Jefferson  should 
develop  that  receptive  spirit  which  made  him  the  typical 
progressive  of  his  times.  As  he  wrote  in  regard  to  the 
proposed  University  of  Virginia :  the  Gothic  idea  that 
we  are  to  look  backwards  instead  of  forwards  for  the 
improvement  of  the  human  mind,  is  not  an  idea  which 
this  country  will  endure. 

These  were  glittering  generalities  in  education,  but 
Jefferson  backed  them  up  by  specific  details.  For  the 
education  of  the  young  there  was  offered  a  scheme  of 
Jeffersonian  simplicity, — it  was  to  start  the  inquiring 
student  with  books  of  a  harmless  sort  and  gradually 
and  insidiously  to  wean  him  away  from  orthodoxy.  He 
might  begin  with  Hutcheson's  Moral  Philosophy  and  con- 
tinue with  Lord  Kames's  Natural  Religion,  but  he  was  to 
end  with  the  Corruptions  of  Christianity  by  Dr.  Samuel 
Priestley,  the  Anglo-American  free-thinker.  It  was  un- 
der the  influence  of  the  latter  that  the  great  deist  in 
the  White  House,  during  the  strenuous  year  of  the 
Louisiana  Purchase,  took  time  to  write  what  he  called 
a  Syllabus  of  an  Estimate  of  the  Merit  of  the  Doc- 
trines of  Jesus,  compared  with  those  of  others.  In  this 
short  work  the  author  proposed  to  take  first  a  gen- 
eral view  of  the  moral  doctrines  of  the  most  remarkable 
of  the  ancient  philosophers ;  next,  a  view  of  the  deism 
of  the  Je^\•s,  to  show  in  what  a  degraded  state  it  was; 
finally,  to  proceed  to  a  view  of  the  life,  character,  and 
doctrines  of  Jesus,  who,  sensible  of  the  incorrectness  of 
their  ideas  of  the  deity  and  of  morality,  endeavored  to 
bring  them  to  the  principles  of  a  pure  deism. 

This  Syllabus  remained  a  mere  sketch;  knowledge  of 
it  leaked  out  and  public  charges  of  atheism  w^ere  brought 


VIRGINIA  AND  JEFFERSON  79 

against  the  President.  Hence  in  the  political  agitations 
of  the  times  Jefferson  declared  he  had  had  no  idea  of 
publishing  a  book  on  religion,  and  that  he  should  as 
soon  think  of  writing  for  the  reformation  of  Bedlam  as 
the  world  of  religious  sects.  So  the  fonner  ambitious 
project  for  a  study  of  comparative  religions  dwindled 
to  a  home-made  harmony  of  the  Gospels.  As  to  the  har- 
mony, Jefferson's  object  was  merely  to  take  the  four 
Evangelists  and  cut  out  from  them  every  text  they  had 
recorded  of  the  moral  precepts  of  Jesus.  There  will  be 
found  remaining,  he  avers,  the  most  sublime  and  benevo- 
lent code  of  morals  which  has  ever  been  offered  to  man, 
"  I  have  performed  this  operation  for  my  own  use,"  he 
continues,  ' '  by  cutting  verse  by  verse  out  of  the  printed 
book,  and  arranging  the  matter  which  is  evidently  his, 
and  which  is  as  easily  distinguishable  as  diamonds  in 
a  dunghill.  The  result  is  an  octavo  of  forty-six  pages 
of  pure  and  unsophisticated  doctrine." 

This  production,  issued  by  Congress  in  its  four- 
fold polyglot  form — Greek,  Latin,  French,  English — a 
full  century  after  its  inception,  is  the  so-called  Jefferson 
Bible.  Bearing  the  title  The  Life  and  Morals  of  Jesus 
of  Nazareth,  the  compiler  acknowledges  that  it  was  at- 
tempted too  hastily,  being  the  work  of  two  or  three 
nights  only  at  Washington,  after  getting  through  the 
evening  task  of  reading  the  letters  and  papers  of  the  day. 
To  the  larger  undertaking  Jefferson  never  went  back, 
perhaps,  because  he  realized  that  the  role  of  a  philosoph- 
ical higher  critic  was  an  impossible  one,  that  to  dis- 
tinguish between  primitive  Christianity  and  later  accre- 
tions was  a  task  beyond  the  scholar  of  that  age.  Jef- 
ferson's partial  comparative  studies  remain  as  the  most 
formal,  but  not  as  the  sole  expression  of  his  beliefs.  In 
addition  to  the  Syllahus  and  the  Bihle  there  is  a  volu- 


so  DEISM 

minous  correspondence,  from  which  the  Virginian's 
somewhat  motley  philosophy  may  be  reconstructed.  In 
general,  that  philosophy  was  an  eclecticism  of  a  pro- 
nounced deistic  type,  since  it  was  the  very  peculiarity 
of  the  deist  to  wear  a  patchwork  philosopher's  cloak, 
yet  to  wear  it  in  the  fashion  of  the  day.  Thus,  when  on 
different  occasions  Jefferson  exclaimed :  "  I  am  an  Epi- 
curean," "I  am  a  Materialist,"  "I  am  a  sect  by 
myself,"  there  w^as  discoverable  beneath  these  vari- 
ous disguises  the  strut  and  swagger  of  the  age  of 
reason. 

Of  the  different  phases  of  thought  through  which  Jef- 
ferson passed  the  most  interesting  was  the  materialistic. 
It  was  his  five  years'  residence  in  France,  before  the 
outbreak  of  the  Revolution,  that  gave  the  free-thinking 
Southerner  an  insight  into  the  possibilities  of  material- 
ism when  carried  to  a  logical  outcome.  As  American 
minister  Jefferson  had  the  fortune  to  enjoy  the  society 
of  the  same  lively  set  of  spirits  as  did  his  predecessor, 
Franklin.  Thus  he  could  recall  to  Cabanis  the  pleasant 
hours  he  passed  with  him  at  the  house  of  Madame 
Helvetius;  confess  that  the  French  literati  are  half  a 
dozen  years  ahead  of  the  American,  and  yet  make  no 
effort  to  catch  up  with  them. 

Here  Jefferson's  fundamental  deism  held  him  back. 
Like  the  more  moderate  exponents  of  the  Enlighten- 
ment, while  disbelieving  in  a  revealed,  he  was  at  the 
same  time  convinced  of  the  advantages  of  a  natural 
theology.  So  it  was  that  "  the  savage  from  the  moun- 
tains of  America,"  living  in  the  midst  of  the  intellectual 
seductions  of  Paris,  could  still  remain  a  believer  in  the 
Eire  Supreme.  The  system  of  Diderot,  D'Alembert, 
and  D'Holbach  was  designated  by  his  friend.  Baron 
Grimm,  an  exposition  of  atheism  for  chambermaids  and 


VIRGINIA  AND  JEFFERSON  81 

barbers.  Jefferson,  not  so  witty  but  more  wise,  criticised 
this  extreme  presentation  more  broadly  and  more 
soberly.  Remarking  that  the  atheistic  was  a  more  nu- 
merous school  in  the  Catholic  countries,  while  the  in- 
fidelity of  the  Protestant  took  generally  the  form  of 
deism,  he  puts  the  arguments  of  both  sides  thus :  When 
the  atheist  descanted  on  the  unceasing  motion  and  cir- 
culation of  matter  through  the  animal,  vegetable,  and 
mineral  kingdoms,  never  resting,  never  annihilated,  al- 
ways changing  form,  and  under  all  forms  gifted  with 
the  power  of  reproduction;  the  theist,  pointing  "  to  the 
heavens  above  and  to  the  earth  beneath  and  to  the  waters 
under  the  earth,"  asked  if  these  things  did  not  pro- 
claim a  first  cause,  possessing  intelligence  and  power. 

Thus  far  Jefferson's  view  of  the  universe  was  that 
of  a  moderate  deist.  The  same  attitude  is  taken  in  his 
characteristic  compromise  between  the  Epicurean  doc- 
trine of  the  eternity  of  the  world  and  the  Puritanic 
doctrine  of  interference  with  the  ordered  course  of  na- 
ture. Calling  himself  a  skeptical  reader,  he  neverthe- 
less reasons  on  the  supposition  that  the  earth  has  had  a 
beginning.  However,  he  does  not  agree  with  those 
biblical  theorists  who  suppose  that  the  Creator  made 
two  jobs  of  his  creation,  that  he  first  made  a  chaotic 
lump  and  set  it  in  motion  and  then,  waiting  the  ages 
necessary  to  form  itself,  stepped  in  a  second  time  to 
create  the  animals  and  plants  which  were  to  in- 
habit it. 

The  last  phase  through  which  the  Southern  thinker 
passed  was  that  of  natural  realism,  or  that  form  of 
thought  which  emphasizes  intuition  and  common  sense. 
When  he  was  young  Jefferson  recalls  that  he  was  fond 
of  speculations  which  seemed  to  promise  some  insight 
into  the  hidden  country.     After  his  retirement  from 


82  DEISM 

active  life  he  rests  content  in  the  belief  that  there  is  a 
reality  which  we  directly  recognize  in  beings,  and  that 
we  are  guided  unconsciously  by  the  unerring  hand  of 
instinct.  In  defense  of  his  final  faith  in  the  common 
sense  of  moral  sense  the  reminiscent  statesman  puts  this 
patriotic  question:  If  our  countr}^  when  pressed  with 
wrongs  at  the  point  of  the  bayonet,  had  been  governed 
by  its  heads  instead  of  its  hearts,  where  should  we  have 
been  now?  Hanging  on  a  gallows  as  high  as  Haman's. 
The  heads  began  to  calculate  and  compare  numbers; 
the  hearts  threw  up  a  few  pulsations  of  their  warmest 
blood;  they  supplied  enthusiasm  against  wealth  and 
numbers;  they  put  their  existence  to  the  hazard  when 
the  hazard  seemed  against  us,  and  they  saved  the  coun- 
try. 

To  bring  Jefferson's  philosophy  into  bolder  relief  it 
may  be  compared  with  that  of  John  Adams,  the  cautious 
speculator  and  taster  of  systems,  who,  even  in  the  days 
of  their  political  rivalry,  Jefferson  considered  "  as  dis- 
interested as  the  being  who  made  him."  Now,  it  was 
after  their  reconciliation  through  Benjamin  Rush  that 
the  correspondence  between  the  Whig  and  the  Federal 
ex-presidents  discloses  two  gentlemen  of  the  old  school, 
both  omnivorous  readers,  both  averse  to  Calvinism  and 
clerical  obscurantism,  both  interested  in  the  rising 
study  of  comparative  religion,  both  tinged  with  the 
current  deistic  thought.  Of  the  two  the  Southerner 
was  more  prone  to  generalizations,  more  impatient  of 
other  men's  beliefs;  the  Northerner  more  tolerant,  not 
inclined  to  go  beyond  "  New  England  guesses."  "  The 
Philosophical  Chief  of  Monticello  is  such  a  heterodox 
and  hungry  fellow,"  so  runs  a  doggerel  couplet  of  the 
day;  Adams  appears  equally  versatile  but  far  less  ar- 
dent.    Confessedly  afflicted  with  a  kind  of  Pyrrhonism, 


VIRGINIA  AND  JEFFERSON  83 

he  numbers   himself  among  those  Protestants  qui  ne 
croycnt  Hen. 

Adams's  ironical  deprecation  of  his  own  knowledge  was 
doubtless  one  reason  for  Jefferson's  drifting  away  from 
the  Gallic  speculation.  Adams  is  sensible  of  the  services 
of  the  French  philosophers  to  Liberty  and  Fraternity, 
yet  he  cannot  but  think  that  they  are  all  destitute  of 
common  sense: 

They  all  seemed  to  think  that  all  Christendom  was  convinced 
as  they  were,  that  all  religion  was  "  visions  Judaicques  "  and 
that  their  effulgent  lights  had  illuminated  all  the  world.  They 
had  not  considered  the  force  of  early  education  on  the  millions 
of  minds  who  had  never  heard  of  their  philosophy.  And  what 
was  their  philosophy?  The  universe  was  matter  only,  and 
eternal ;  spirit  was  a  word  without  a  meaning.  All  beings 
and  attributes  were  of  eternal  necessity;  conscience,  morality, 
were  all  nothing  but  fate.  Who,  and  what  is  fate?  He  must 
be  a  sensible  fellow.  He  must  be  a  master  of  science.  He 
must  calculate  eclipses  in  his  head  by  intuition,  and  what  is 
more  comfortable  than  all  the  rest,  he  must  be  good  natured, 
for  this  is  upon  the  whole  a  good  world. 

In  these  jocular  criticisms  there  was  a  sly  dig  at 
Jefferson's  deism.  The  French  fate  bore  a  striking 
resemblance  to  his  benevolent  deity,  trust  in  whom  would 
bring  the  philosophic  millennium.  And  so  Adams  writes 
again :  * '  Let  me  now  ask  you  very  seriously,  my  friend, 
where  are  now  in  1813,  the  perfection  and  the  per- 
fectibility of  human  nature  ?  Where  is  now  the  progress 
of  the  human  mind?  Where  is  the  amelioration  of  so- 
ciety ?  .  .  .  I  leave  those  profound  philosophers  to  enjoy 
their  transporting  hopes,  provided  always  that  they  will 
not  engage  us  in  French  Revolutions.  .  .  .  "  And  so 
throughout  the  correspondence. — the  impartial  Novan- 
glian  meets  the  strenuous  Virginian  with  whimsical 
advice.     When  as  Epicurean  he  becomes  too  stoical,  he 


84  DEISM 

urges  him  to  eat  his  canvas-back  duck ;  when  as  deist  he 
becomes  too  dogmatical,  he  remarks:  "  It  has  been  long, 
very  long,  a  settled  opinion  in  my  mind,  that  there  is 
now,  never  will  be,  and  never  was  but  one  being  who 
can  understand  the  universe.  And  that  it  is  not  only 
vain,  but  wicked,  for  insects  to  pretend  to  compre- 
hend it." 

It  was  easy  for  Adams  to  write  in  this  way;  an  ag- 
nostic's apology  was  tolerated  in  the  case  of  one  who 
would  leave  "  metaphysics  in  the  clouds."  But  with 
Jefferson  things  were  different ;  politics  complicated  the 
situation  and  faction  spoiled  philosophy.  The  Federal- 
ists linked  together  Jeffersonianism,  atheism,  and  the 
excesses  of  the  French  Revolution.  They  called  the 
President  a  Jacobin,  an  infidel,  and  a  republican  villain. 
They  spoke  of  a  dangerous,  deistical,  and  Utopian 
school  of  which  a  great  personage  from  Virginia  was 
a  favored  pupil.  They  said  his  principles  relished  so 
strongly  of  Paris,  and  were  seasoned  in  such  a  pro- 
fusion of  French  garlic,  that  he  offended  the  whole  na- 
tion. In  these  attacks  the  Federal  clergy  of  New  Eng- 
land were  implicated.  "When  Jefferson  had  brought 
over  from  France  the  arch-infidel  Thomas  Paine  in  a 
government  ship,  they  spoke  of  him  as  an  Ephraim  who 
had  become  entangled  with  the  heathen.  Jefferson's 
defenders  were  unable  to  mend  matters.  The  author  of 
the  Hamiltoniad,  or  an  Extinguisher  of  the  Eoyal  Fac- 
tion of  New  England  dismisses  the  worn-out  tale  of  the 
President 's  irreligion  by  retorting  that  ' '  he  has  thrown 
into  the  lap  of  Morality  the  purest  apothegms  of  the 
Apostles  and  Fathers;  he  confounds  the  politicians  by 
calling  them  Tory  bloodhounds,  yelping  upon  the  dan- 
gers that  may  arise  from  the  Virginian  or  Southern  in- 
fluence."    These  mixed   metaphors  betray  a   political 


VIRGINIA  AND  JEFFERSON  85 

confusion  in  which  Jefferson  found  it  hard  to  pre- 
serve a  philosophic  calm.  He  asserted  that  the  priests, 
to  soothe  their  resentments  against  the  act  of  Virginia 
for  establishing  religious  freedom,  wished  him  to  be 
thought  atheist,  deist,  or  devil,  who  could  advocate  free- 
dom from  their  religious  dictations.  Having  opposed 
the  scheme  of  a  state-supported  church — "  Christianity 
for  pence  and  power  " — he  pronounced  IMassachusetts 
and  Connecticut  the  last  retreat  of  monkish  darkness 
and  bigotry. 

And  so  against  the  narrowness  of  the  North  and  as 
a  bulwark  against  the  "  pious  young  monks  of  Harvard 
and  Yale,"  Jefferson  proposed  to  erect  his  Southern 
University.  In  the  plan  for  this  institution  which  he 
proposed  to  the  Virginia  legislature,  he  intended  to 
place  the  entire  responsibility  for  religious  training 
upon  an  ethical  basis,  where  all  sects  could  agree.  As  he 
explained  the  matter-.  "  The  proofs  of  the  being  of  a  God, 
the  creator,  preserver  and  supreme  ruler  of  the  uni- 
verse, the  author  of  all  the  relations  of  morality,  and 
the  laws  and  obligations  these  infer,  will  be  within  the 
province  of  the  professor  of  Ethics;  to  which  adding 
the  development  of  these  moral  obligations  in  which  all 
sects  agree  ...  a  basis  will  be  found  common  to  all 
sects."  Because  of  his  plan  of  having  no  professorship 
of  divinity  and  allowing  independent  schools  of  the- 
ology to  be  established  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  Uni- 
versity, Jefferson  complained  that  a  handle  had  been 
made  to  disseminate  an  idea  that  this  is  an  institution, 
not  only  of  no  religion,  but  against  all  religion.  But  in 
spite  of  his  opponents'  fulminations  "  the  liberality  of 
this  State,"  concludes  the  Virginia  humanist,  "  will 
support  this  institution  and  give  fair  play  to  the  cultiva- 
tion of  reason." 


86  DEISM 

5.    Thomas  Paine  and  Popular  Deism 

In  examining  the  books  of  the  early  colleges  and  the 
thoughts  of  their  representative  men,  there  have  been 
found  numberless  signs  of  colonial  free-thinking,  of 
mental  independency  before  political  independence.  In 
addition  to  these  academic  studies  there  must  now  be 
made  a  search  for  the  more  elusive  traces  of  the  spread- 
ing of  infidelity,  before  the  actual  outburst  of  revolu- 
tionary thought.  As  has  been  already  intimated,  this 
movement,  beginning  as  a  popular  reaction,  was  more 
felt  than  avowed,  more  a  matter  of  subtle  distrust  than 
of  precise  knowledge.  It  was  the  faint  smoke  in  the 
air,  presaging  the  coming  forest  fire.  It  was  a  time 
when  the  clergy  might  warn  against  "  the  insidious 
encroachments  of  innovation,"  but  when  the  laity  pre- 
ferred the  Indian  summer  of  indifference.  Toleration 
was  pervasive.  It  has  been  described  as  gradually  dif- 
fused over  the  land  by  such  fostering  circumstances  as 
colonial  impatience  with  prescription  and  custom,  and 
that  original  adventurous  spirit  which,  combined  with 
dissatisfaction  with  home  conditions  and  voluntary 
exile,  insensibly  fitted  the  mind  for  the  propositions  of 
liberty. 

Of  these  propositions,  the  liberty  to  think  and  feel 
as  one  liked  was  the  most  conducive  to  the  coming  of 
free-thought.  Paine 's  Age  of  Reason  was  especially  op- 
portune because  it  was  in  agreement  with  that  liberty 
of  conscience  granted  or  implied  in  so  many  of  the  Revo- 
lutionary documents.  Among  these  documents  we  may 
refer  to  Patrick  Henry's  Bill  of  Rights,  in  which  he 
held  that  religion  can  be  directed  only  by  reason.  To 
this  Madison  added  that  all  men  are  equally  entitled  to 
the  full  and  free  exercise  of  religion  according  to  the 


THOMAS  PAINE  AND  POPULAR  DEISM         87 

dictates  of  conscience.  This  was  followed  in  1785  by 
Jefferson's  Declaratory  Act,  establishing  religious  free-' 
dom  in  Virginia,  and  by  the  Pennsylvania  constitution, 
advocated  by  Franklin,  which  contained  the  clause  as  to 
the  natural  and  inalienable  right  to  worship  according  to 
the  dictates  of  the  understanding.  In  brief,  twelve  out 
of  the  thirteen  original  States  allowed  an  increased 
measure  of  mental  freedom.  It  was  only  in  Massa- 
chusetts that  a  dread  of  liberty  was  expressed.  There 
we  find  the  question  debated  as  to  whether  public  offices 
might  not  be  held  "  even  among  those  who  have  no 
other  guide  to  the  way  of  virtue  and  heaven,  than  the 
dictates  of  natural  religion." 

The  political  expressions  of  rationalism  in  the  Revo- 
lutionary period  are  many,  the  philosophical  few.  Be- 
tween the  Stamp  Act  and  the  adoption  of  the  Constitu- 
tion, there  was  but  one  native  work  worth  mentioning 
in  the  deistic  connection.  But  Ethan  Allen's  Reason 
the  Only  Oracle  of  Man  did  not  arrest  the  popular  at- 
tention. So  it  remained  for  a  naturalized  American  to 
turn  the  tide  of  thought.  It  was  the  Age  of  Reason  of 
Thomas  Paine  which  marked  high  water  in  the  deistic 
movement,  for  it  was  carried  upon  the  wave  of  enthusi- 
asm caused  by  the  author's  Revolutionary  pamphlets 
Common  Sense  and  the  Rights  of  Man.  The  radical 
writer  affirms  that,  as  his  motive  in  his  political  works 
had  been  to  rescue  man  from  tyranny  and  false  sys- 
tems and  false  principles  of  government,  so  in  his  re- 
ligious publications  it  was  to  bring  man  to  the  right 
reason  God  had  given  him,  unshackled  by  fable  and  the 
fiction  of  books. 

The  Age  of  Reason  is  a  perfect  example  of  the  popu- 
larizing of  current  deistic  opinions.  It  has  the  same 
method  of  so-called  mathematical  proof,  the  same  me- 


88  DEISM 

chanical  view  of  nature,  the  same  disregard  of  the 
problem  of  evil,  the  same  aversion  to  mystery,  the  same 
iridescent  dream  as  to  mankind's  perfectibility,  the 
same  delusion  as  to  monotheism  being  a  primitive  be- 
lief,— "  Adam  was  created  a  deist  "  says  this  prehis- 
toric critic.  In  a  word,  the  book  is  anything  but  origi- 
nal. With  the  exception  of  a  phrase  or  two  like  the 
' '  religion  of  humanity, ' '  there  is  not  an  idea  in  it  which 
cannot  be  matched  in  the  writings  of  the  English  free- 
thinkers of  the  Georgian  era.  Paine  simply  repeats,  in 
the  language  of  the  street,  the  arguments  of  Collins 
against  prophecj'^,  of  Woolston  against  miracles,  of 
Tindal  against  revelation,  of  Morgan  against  the  Old 
Testament,  of  Chubb  against  Christian  morality. 

This  is  the  negative  side  of  the  book.  More  effective 
is  the  positive.  In  place  of  the  false  "  bases  of  Chris- 
tianity ' '  Paine  would  put  what  he  calls  a  true  theology. 
He  cannot  see  how  man  can  hold  to  a  system  where 
Satan  is  deified  and  given  power  equal  to  that  of  the 
Almighty;  where  man  is  called  an  outcast,  a  beggar,  a 
mumper,  calling  himself  a  worm  and  the  fertile  earth  a 
dunghill,  and  all  the  blessings  of  life  but  the  thankless 
name  of  vanities.  But  there  is  a  substitute  for  all 
these  corruptions  "  from  Moloch  to  modern  predesti- 
narianism," — it  is  eighteenth-century  optimism,  thus 
grandiloquently  set  forth:  If  objects  for  gratitude  and 
admiration  are  our  desire,  do  they  not  present  them- 
selves every  hour  to  our  eyes?  Do  we  not  see  a  fair 
creation  prepared  to  receive  us  the  instant  we  are  bom 
— a  world  furnished  to  our  hands,  that  costs  us  noth- 
ing? Is  it  we  that  light  up  the  sun;  that  pour  down 
the  rain;  and  fill  the  earth  with  abundance?  Whether 
we  sleep  or  wake,  the  vast  machinery  of  the  universe 
still  goes  on. 


THOMAS  PAINE  AND  POPULAR  DEISM         89 

The  effect  of  the  Age  of  Ecason  on  the  community 
may  be  easily  imagined.  The  clergj'  attacked  it,  the 
colleges  criticised  it,  but  the  populace  read  it.  Dedi- 
cated to  the  author's  fellow-citizens  of  the  United  States 
of  America,  it  was  sold  for  a  few  pence  the  copy  or 
given  away  gratis.  The  first  edition,  printed  in  France, 
was  spread  broadcast  through  the  free-thinking  so- 
cieties affiliated  with  the  Jacobin  Club  of  Philadelphia. 
Within  two  decades  the  pamphlet  was  to  be  found  on  the 
banks  of  the  Genesee  and  Ohio ;  within  two  more  it  was 
circulated  among  the  reader  of  Volnoy  and  Voltaire 
and  in  those  places  in  Tennessee  and  Kentucky  whose 
names  still  attest  the  French  sympathies  of  the  first 
settlers.  It  is  astonishing  how  far  the  light  of  nature 
threw  its  beams.  The  president  of  Transylvania  Uni- 
versity was  suspected  of  teaching  an  unrestrained  natu- 
ralism, and  a  friend  of  Abraham  Lincoln  reported  that 
in  Indiana  the  Age  of  Reason  passed  from  hand  to  hand, 
furnishing  food  for  the  evening's  discussion  in  tavern 
and  village  store. 

The  book,  moreover,  met  with  that  sincerest  form  of 
flattery — imitation.  An  example  of  this  was  Elihu  Palm- 
er's Prospect,  or  View  of  the  Moral  World  for  the  Year 
1804.  According  to  the  allegorical  thunder  and  light- 
ning frontispiece,  the  Book  of  Saints  and  Ten  Command- 
ments are  being  dashed  to  the  ground  from  the  Altar  of 
Truth  and  Justice  to  be  supplanted  by  the  Age  of  Rea- 
son and  the  Eights  of  Man.  Of  an  equally  destructive 
aspect  was  George  Houston's  New  York  Correspondent 
of  1829,  containing  lectures  delivered  before  the  Free 
Press  Association  on  the  inconsistencies,  absurdities,  and 
contradictions  of  the  Bible.  This  journal  also  presented 
the  advanced  views  of  Fanny  Wright,  a  sort  of  Wilhelm 
Meister  in  petticoats,  who  wandered  over  the  country 


90  DEISM 

from  Woodstock,  Vermont,  to  Cincinnati,  Ohio.  The 
opponents  of  popular  deism  now  raised  their  heads. 
The  free-thinking  societies,  spread  through  New  Eng- 
land and  the  Middle  States,  were  designated  the 
banded  Goths  and  Vandals  of  political  atheism.  The 
autlior  of  the  Sceptic's  Manual  retailed  petty  and  ma- 
licious gossip  concerning  the  last  days  of  Hobbes  and 
Hume,  Voltaire  and  Paine.  In  the  Antidote  to  Deism, 
Ethan  Allen  is  called  an  ignorant  and  profane  deist, 
Paine  a  drunkard,  to  reason  with  whom  would  be  like 
casting  pearls  before  swine. 

Such  were  the  attacks  of  the  minor  clergy.  In  the 
colleges  the  battle  was  waged  more  in  accordance  with 
the  rules  of  war.  The  most  prolific  of  the  writers  against 
deism,  and  the  materialism  which  happened  to  be  asso- 
ciated with  it,  was  President  Timothy  Dwight  of  Yale. 
As  one  of  the  Hartford  wits,  he  had  composed  a  sort  of 
American  Dunciad,  the  Triumph  of  Infidelity,  which 
was  ironically  dedicated  to  Voltaire.  How  that  poem 
confined  the  deist  in  the  pillory  of  his  own  terms,  and 
flung  into  his  teeth  his  own  arguments,  is  to  be  seen 
from  these  lines: 

"His  soul  not  cloath'd  in  attributes  divine; 
But  a  nice  watch-spring  to  the  grand  machine. 

Enough,  the  Bible  is  by  wits  arraigned. 

Genteel  men  doubt  it,  smart  men  say  it's  feigned." 

In  contrast  to  this  effusion  were  the  earlier  poems  of 
Dwight 's  salad  days  which  showed  a  decided  leaning  to 
the  philosophy  of  the  French  Encyclopaidists.  In  the 
Columbia  and  the  Conquest  of  Canaan,  French 
phrases  are  curiously  wrought  into  a  sort  of  biblical 
epic  on  the  New  World.    The  sons  of  this  ' '  blissful  Eden 


THOMAS  PAINE  AND  POPULAR  DEISM         91 

bright  "  are  urged  to  "  teach  hiws  to  reign  and  save  the 
Rights  of  Man."  The  author  subsequently  explained 
that  these  were  the  mock  heroics  of  a  time  when  the 
strong  sympathy  towards  the  leaders  of  the  French 
Revolution  prepared  to  make  us  the  miserable  dupes  of 
their  principles  and  declarations.  But  the  doctrines  of 
the  14th  of  July  were  not  to  be  confused  with  those  of 
the  4th  of  July.  As  the  head  of  Yale  College,  Dr. 
Dwight  became  the  leader  of  the  forces  against  deism. 
His  Century  Discourse  gives  a  trenchant  account  of  the 
progress  of  infidelity, — its  descent  from  the  lofty  philo- 
sophical discourse  to  the  newspaper  paragraph,  its 
spread  among  the  masses,  and  the  ultimate  return  to 
more  sober  thought.  "  Infidelity,"  the  discourse  pro- 
ceeds, "  was  first  theism,  or  natural  religion,  then  mere 
unbelief,  then  animalism,  then  skepticism,  then  partial, 
and  finally,  total  atheism.  The  infidel  writers  have  used 
terms  so  abstract,  and  a  phraseology  so  mysterious  as  to 
attract  readers  fond  of  novelty,  but  the  common  people, 
never  honored  by  Voltaire  with  any  higher  title  than  the 
rabble  or  the  mob,  have  been  caught  by  these  writers, 
who  volunteered  to  vindicate  their  wrongs  and  assert 
their  rights.  Happily  it  was  soon  discovered  that  the 
liberty  of  infidels  was  not  the  liberty  of  New  England ; 
that  France  instead  of  being  free,  merely  changed 
through  a  series  of  tyrannies ;  and  that  man,  unre- 
strained by  law  and  religion,  is  a  mere  beast  of  prey. 
Even  sober  infidels  began  to  be  alarmed  for  their  own 
peace,  safety,  and  enjoyments." 

The  air  of  gravity  and  severity  about  this  passage  is 
explained  by  what  men  remembered  of  the  events  fol- 
lowing the  peace  of  1783,  the  intrigues  of  Genet,  the 
terrorism  incited  by  Freneau,  when  IMarket  Street, 
Philadelphia,   was   filled   with   a   mob,   the   distrust   of 


92  DEISM 

Napoleon  implied  in  President  Adams's  proclamation. 
This  passage  is  also  explained  by  the  wild  and  vague 
expectations  everywhere  entertained,  especially  among 
the  young,  of  a  new  order  of  things  about  to  commence, 
in  which  Christianity  would  be  laid  aside  as  obsolete. 
In  the  exultation  of  political  emancipation,  infidel 
philosophers  found  ready  listeners  when  they  repre- 
sented the  restraints  of  religion  as  fetters  of  the  con- 
science, and  moral  obligations  as  shackles  imposed  by 
bigotry  and  priestcraft. 

At  Harvard  College,  the  academic  attitude  toward 
deism  was  somewhat  complicated.  Federal  in  politics 
and  Unitarian  in  religion,  it  was  doubly  averse  to  the 
enthusiasms  and  raptures  of  Franco-American  rational- 
ism; it  deplored  the  "  foul  spirit  of  innovation,"  and 
sought  some  check  to  the  "  infuriated  steeds  of  in- 
fidelity." At  Princeton  the  Age  of  Beason  was  opposed 
by  the  philosophy  of  common  sense.  Where  Berkeleian 
idealism  had  been  driven  out,  the  Bridgewater  Treatises 
came  in.  According  to  its  catalogue,  the  library 
abounded  in  volumes  like  Dick's  Celestial  Scenery  Illus- 
trating the  Perfections  of  the  Deity,  and  Front's  Chemis- 
try, Meteorology  and  the  Functions  of  Digestion  consid- 
ered with  reference  to  Natural  Theology.  The  favorite 
text-book,  as  in  the  majority  of  conservative  colleges, 
was  Dugald  Stewart,  and  Stewart's  aim  was  declared 
to  be  to  stem  the  inundation  of  the  skeptical,  or  rather 
atheistical  publications  which  were  imported  from  Eu- 
rope. But  a  conservative  literature  does  not  alone  ex- 
plain the  stringent  policy  of  Princeton ;  behind  the 
books  were  such  facts  as  that,  after  the  revolutionary 
war  when  the  students  had  been  "  freed  from  all  sanc- 
tuary and  Sabbath  restraint,"  there  was  left  only  a 
handful  of  students  who  professed  themselves  Christians 


THOMAS  PAINE  AND  POPULAR  DEISM  93 

and  that,  in  1S02,  the  trustees  in  their  "  Address  to  the 
Inhabitants  of  the  United  States,"  declared  that  their 
purpose  was  to  make  this  institution  an  asylum  for  pious 
youth,  in  this  daj'  of  general  and  lamentable  depravity. 

Popular  deism  was  rejected  by  the  clergy  and  thrust 
out  by  the  colleges.  It  remains  to  be  seen  how  the  pub- 
lic first  accepted,  then  grew  tired  of  it.  Chancellor 
Kent  said  that  in  his  younger  days  there  were  very  few 
professional  men  who  were  not  infidels;  Ezra  Ripley, 
that  a  large  portion  of  the  learning  not  possessed  by  the 
clergy  leaned  to  deism.  A  few  specific  events  will  illus- 
trate how  this  rapid  growth  of  the  army  of  free-thinkers 
was  followed  by  an  equally  rapid  defection  from  the 
ranks.  In  1801,  James  Dana  of  Connecticut  said  that 
infidelity  appeared  to  be  gaining  ground;  by  1810,  it 
was  reported  that  infidelity  abounded  to  an  alarming 
degree  and  in  various  shapes  in  the  district  west  of  the 
Military  Tract  in  New  York.  In  1822  an  anonymous 
"  letter  to  a  deist  in  Baltimore  "  stated  that  deism  is 
taking  root  rapidly  and  soon  will  grow  up  surprisingly 
and  become  the  only  fashionable  religion.  In  Virginia 
about  the  same  time  Bishop  Meade  asserted  that  in  every 
young  man  he  met  he  expected  to  find  a  skeptic,  if  not  an 
avowed  unbeliever. 

This  was  the  advance  of  the  movement.  A  reaction 
followed  which  started  in  protests  from  the  church,  the 
state,  and  the  professions,  and  ended  in  a  series  of  re- 
ligious revivals.  In  1798,  the  Presbyterian  General 
Assembly  uttered  a  warning  against  the  abounding  in- 
fidelity which  tends  to  atheism  itself;  in  1800,  the  Presi- 
dent referred  to  the  dissemination  of  principles  sub- 
versive of  the  foundations  of  all  religious,  moral,  and 
social  obligations,  that  have  produced  incalculable  mis- 
chiefs in  other  countries ;  in  1824,  Dr.  Charles  Caldwell 


94  DEISM 

thought  fit  to  write  a  Defence  of  the  Medical  Profession 
against  the  charge  of  Infidelity  and  Irreligion.  The 
unpopularity  of  deism  is  likewise  exliibited  in  the  light 
literature  of  the  day.  Fenimore  Cooper  describes  one 
of  his  heroines  as  being  properly  impressed  with  the 
horrors  of  a  deist's  doctrines,  and  another  as  shrinking 
from  his  company,  Harriet  Martineau  wrote  back  to 
England  how  she  was  told  of  one  and  another  with  an 
air  of  mystery,  like  that  with  which  one  is  informed  of 
any  person  being  insane,  or  intemperate  or  insolvent, 
that  so  and  so  was  thought  to  be  an  unbeliever. 

The  results  of  deism  in  America  may  now  be  briefly 
summed  up.  Among  the  people  the  majority  were 
drawn  off  by  an  emotional  substitute  for  thought,  the 
revivals  that  swept  over  the  country.  At  bottom  the 
deistic  system  was  too  cold  and  formal;  it  externalized 
deity,  lacked  a  continuing  enthusiasm,  and  so  failed  to 
satisfy  the  cravings  of  emotional  excitement.  The 
philosophy  of  a  Franklin  might  appeal  to  the  business, 
it  did  not  appeal  to  the  bosoms  of  men.  In  the  colleges 
those  who  were  not  affected  by  revivalism  were  held 
in  cheek  by  circumscribed  courses  presenting  the  simi- 
larities between  natural  and  revealed  religion.  Finally, 
among  the  clergy,  the  great  part  stood  for  orthodoxy. 
As  expressed  by  one  of  the  numerous  century  sermon- 
izers,  there  was  no  neutral  ground  to  be  taken  between 
evangelical  doctrines  and  infidelity. 

Such  were  the  results  of  the  hundred  years'  war  for 
free-thinking, — apparently  fruitless  unless  judged  by 
later  events.  One  such  event  was  New  England  tran- 
scendentalism, whose  programme  on  its  negative  side  was 
almost  precisely  what  the  deists  had  been  denying;  on 
its  positive,  an  assertion  of  what  they  had  been  lacking. 
Transcendentalism  denied  the  need  of  miracle,  revela- 


» 


THOMAS  PAINE  AND  POPULAR  DEISM  95 

tion,  dependence  on  an  outward  standard  of  faitli ;  it 
affirmed  the  need  of  intuition,  mystic  ecstasy,  inward 
dependence  upon  an  immanent  life.  As  the  philosopher 
of  Concord  exclaimed:  "  Pie  re  is  now  a  perfect  religion, 
which  can  be  set  in  an  intelligible  and  convincing  man- 
ner before  all  men  by  their  reason." 


CHAPTER  IV 
MATERIALISM 

1.    The  French  Influences 

The  story  of  materialism  in  America  is  the  story  of 
a  struggle  for  existence  but  not  of  the  survival  of  the 
fittest, — so  at  least  thought  its  opponents.  The  move- 
ment was  at  first  chiefly  described  by  those  who  were 
hostile  to  its  spirit  and  its  aim.  As  a  form  of  genial 
naturalism  it  was  in  marked  contrast  to  the  austere 
supernaturalism  of  the  North.  And  yet  it  is  to  its 
Northern  adversaries  that  we  must  go  for  our  earliest 
accounts.  One  of  the  founders  of  the  Harvard  Medical 
School  explains  that  modem  philosophers  say  matter  is 
inert,  yet  that  there  are  certain  powers  which  the  par- 
ticles of  matter  have  of  acting  on  one  another,  as 
gravitation,  cohesion,  the  attraction  of  crystallization, 
of  magnetism,  of  electricity,  of  chemical  attraction.  But 
none  of  these  merit  the  name  of  vitality,  nor  in  them 
is  the  origin  of  intelligent  ideas  to  be  looked  for.  Sen- 
sible objects  may  be  the  destined  medium  to  awaken  the 
dormant  energies  of  man's  understanding,  yet  these 
energies  are  no  more  contained  in  sense  than  the  ex- 
plosion of  the  cannon  in  the  spark  which  gives  it  fire. 
Again  Noah  Webster,  the  lexicographer,  has  "  some 
doubts  "  concerning  Erasmus  Darwin  and  his  "  laws  of 
organic  life."  The  author  of  such  "  laws  "  by  merely 
observing  the  phenomena  of  animal  motion  might  trace 
them  to  fibrous  contractions,  and  fibrous  contractions  to 

96 


THE  FRENCH  INFLUENCES  97 

irritation  of  external  objects,  to  pleasure,  pain,  voli- 
tion, or  association;  but  at  last  he  is  compelled  to  in- 
quire why  and  how  the  fibers  become  obedient  to  the 
impulses  of  stimulus.  ^Mounting  a  step  higher  in  the 
catenation  of  causes,  he  is  compelled  to  create  or  imagine 
a  certain  something  to  reside  in  the  medullary  sub- 
stance of  the  brain  to  which  he  gives  the  denomination 
of  the  spirit  of  animation.  What  this  principle  is  he 
makes  no  attempt  to  explain ;  and  the  very  existence  of 
it  is  rather  assumed  than  proved. 

These  opinions  represent  the  jealous  attitude  of  the 
North  toward  the  prevalent  system  of  the  South.  A 
fairer  and  indeed  a  mediating  attitude  was  taken  by  a 
writer  of  the  Middle  States.  Reviewing  the  opinions  of 
the  principal  materialists  of  the  eighteenth  century 
Samuel  Miller  of  Princeton  shows  how  they  resemble 
those  of  the  ancients.  Just  as  when  Epicurus  supposed 
the  soul  of  man  to  be  a  material  substance,  but  a  very 
refined  and  attenuated  kind  of  matter,  so  Dr.  Priestley 
denies  that  there  is  any  ground  for  making  a  distinction 
between  the  soul  of  man  and  the  body,  supposing  the 
whole  human  constitution  to  be  made  up  of  one  homo- 
geneous substance. 

In  turning  from  the  English  to  the  French  material- 
ists such  as  Condillac  and  Helvetius,  the  Princetonian 
touches  on  the  heart  of  the  matter.  The  real  agents  for 
the  naturalizing  of  French  materialism  in  the  South 
were  Franklin  and  Jefferson.  It  was  Franklin  as  a 
philosopher,  in  the  eighteenth-century  use  of  the  word 
as  a  natural  philosopher,  who  chiefly  stimulated  the  in- 
terchange of  ideas  between  France  and  the  western 
world.  Had  it  not  been  for  the  Philadelphian's  elec- 
trical experiments,  there  would  have  boen  fewer  points 
of   contact   between    the   two    republics.      The   modern 


98  MATERIALISM 

Prometheus  drew  lightning  from  the  clouds,  as  Turgot's 
famous  lines  expressed  it ;  lie  also  drew  ideas  from  men, 
and  despite  that  non-conducting  medium,  the  Anglo- 
American  mind,  succeeded  in  introducing  into  the 
colonies  many  of  the  stimulating  notions  of  his  French 
acquaintances.  Among  those  of  a  philosophic  turn  who 
had  a  transatlantic  influence  were  Buffon,  whose  View 
of  Nature  fortified  the  American  deists;  Cabanis,  whose 
materialism  influenced  Jefferson;  Chastellux,  who  an- 
ticipated the  philosophic  travels  of  De  Tocqueville ;  Con- 
doreet,  whose  Progress  of  the  Human  Mind  received  an 
early  printing  in  Maryland ;  Crevecceur,  whose  letters 
on  America  fascinated  and  misled  Europeans;  du  Pont 
de  Nemours,  who  projected  a  settlement  of  philosophers 
on  the  Mississippi;  Lavoisier,  whose  pneumatic  theory 
was  used  to  explode  the  phlogistic  view  of  Priestley  in 
Pennsylvania ;  Quesnay,  a  follower  of  Lafayette,  whose 
grandson  sought  to  found  a  kind  of  French  academy  in 
Virginia ;  Rochefoucauld  due  d  'Enville,  who  translated 
the  Constitutions  of  the  thirteen  original  States ;  Volney, 
whose  Euins,  or  Revolutions  of  Empires  stirred  up  great 
popular  interest. 

In  this  impressive  list  of  those  who  threw  in  their  lot 
with  the  struggling  republic  there  is  one  that  stands 
out.  When  Jefferson  exclaimed:  "  I  am  a  materialist," 
it  was  not  so  much  because  he  had  read  Epicurus  as  be- 
cause he  had  heard  Cabanis.  While  the  Virginian 
was  in  Paris,  Cabanis  had  delivered  before  the  Academy 
the  series  of  lectures  on  the  relations  between  mind  and 
body  which  contained  the  famous  apothegms:  "  the 
brain  secretes  thought,"  "  the  nerves  make  the  man." 
So,  on  hearing  the  lectures  of  the  distinguished  sensa- 
tionalist, Jefferson  asks :  Why  may  not  the  mode  of  action 
called  thought  have  been  given  to  a  material  organ  of 


THE  FRENCH  INFLUENCES  99 

a  peculiar  structure,  as  that  of  magnetism  is  to  the 
needle,  or  of  elasticity  to  the  spring  by  a  particular 
manipulation  of  the  steel?  They  observe  that  on  igni- 
tion of  the  needle  or  spring,  their  magnetism  or  elas- 
ticity ceases.  So  on  dissolution  of  the  material  organ 
by  death,  its  action  of  thought  may  cease  also,  for  nobody 
supposes  that  the  magnetism  or  elasticity  retires  to 
hold  a  substantive  and  distinct  existence. 

Jefferson's  sympathy  with  the  Gallic  culture  was  im- 
portant ;  indeed  his  mission  to  France  was  a  vital  im- 
pulse in  his  life  and  equally  vital  in  the  life  of  Southern 
thought.  That  sympathy  was,  of  course,  fostered  by  the 
political  situation.  The  regard  felt  by  the  French  for 
this  country  led  to  an  intellectual  entente  cordiale.  In 
spite  of  this  good  feeling  there  were  some  who  deplored 
the  presence  of  such  effective  advocates  of  the  new  natu- 
ralism as  were  the  followers  of  Lafayette.  These  ad- 
vocates were  described  by  the  elder  President  D^^^ght  of 
Yale  as  men  of  polished  manners,  improved  minds,  and 
superior  address,  who  knew  how  to  insinuate  the  gross- 
est sentiments  in  a  delicate  and  inoffensive  manner, 
and  were  at  the  same  time  friends  and  aids  of  the  Ameri- 
can cause — nos  trcs  chers  et  tres  grands  Amis,  et  Allies. 

As  a  mirror  of  the  Gallic  mind  Jefferson  became  a  tar- 
get for  the  orthodox.  Whenever  he  tried  to  introduce 
French  literature  he  was  invariably  criticised.  When 
he  thought  Becourt's  Sur  la  Creation  du  Monde  to  be 
merely  an  innocent  attack  on  the  Newtonian  philosophy, 
he  was  mortified  to  find  that  certain  persons  contem- 
plated its  censorship  by  the  government  as  an  offense 
against  religion.  In  these  affairs,  Jefferson's  country- 
men showed  themselves  in  a  bad  light;  once  they  had 
boon  willing  enough  to  receive  French  gold,  now  they 
seemed  to  fear  the  Gauls  even  when  they  were  bearing 


100  MATERIALISM 

gifts.  Wiiat  this  narrow  attitude  led  to,  and  how  the 
Gallic  invasion  was  checked  has  been  pointed  out.  If 
French  ideas  had  really  penetrated  Virginia  society 
they  would  have  become  as  dominant  in  the  South  as 
Gennan  ideas  later  became  in  the  North ;  it  was  one  of 
the  difficult  tasks  in  Southern  educational  history  to 
dislodge  French  philosophy  from  its  academic  strong- 
holds in  North  and  South  Carolina ;  it  was  done  by 
a  strong  current  of  Scotch  Presbyterianism  proceeding 
from  Princeton  College  southwards.  And  so  it  was  that 
after  all  his  endeavors  to  introduce  the  philosophical  cul- 
ture of  France,  the  President's  plans  seem  to  have  met 
with  defeat. 

2.   Joseph  Priestley,  and  the  Homogeneity  of  Man 

In  1794  there  came  to  America  Joseph  Priestley, 
metaphysician  and  materialist.  In  the  words  of  Jeffer- 
son, he  fled  from  the  fires  and  mobs  of  Birmingham  in 
order  to  gain  a  refuge  in  the  land  of  free  thought.  His 
reputation,  based  on  his  discovery  of  oxygen,  preceded 
him  and  insured  his  welcome.  Also  his  particular  praise 
of  Franklin  in  his  history  of  electricity,  prejudiced 
Americans  in  his  favor.  In  this  history  Franklinisra 
was  used  to  explain  the  constitution  of  matter.  Instead 
of  that  coarse  and  impenetrable  substance  which  it  is 
generally  represented  to  be,  Priestley  utilizes  the  con- 
ception of  the  American's  electrical  fluid  as  consisting 
of  particles  extremely  subtle,  since  it  ,can  permeate 
common  matter. 

We  have  here  Franklinism  combined  with  a  dynamism 
much  like  that  of  Colden's.  It  is  interesting  to  know 
how  the  distinguished  English  chemist  unites  these  doc- 
trines in  order  to  explain  the  relations  of  mind  and 


JOSEPH  PRIESTL-EY  Wl 

body.  His  aim  is  to  show  that  these  apparently  contra- 
dictory substances  are  really  homogeneous.  He  renders 
them  of  like  substance  by  performing  a  contrary  process 
upon  each.  ]\Iind  he  coarsens  to  a  certain  degree ;  matter 
he  attenuates  to  a  like  degree.  There  is  now  a  common 
area  upon  which  the  two  substances  overlap.  This  is 
human  nature,  for  in  man  there  is  a  meeting-point  where 
the  two  substances  are  harmoniously  joined.  No  longer 
is  body  that  coarse  and  impenetrable  substance  which 
it  is  generally  represented  to  be.  No  longer  is  mind 
that  indefinite  and  aerated  substance  to  which  tradition 
has  held.  No,  the  two  are  practically  consubstantial 
and  one  can  be  put  in  terms  of  the  other.  Indeed,  the 
learned  author  has  no  objection,  if  his  critics  choose  to 
call  this  matter  by  the  name  of  spirit.  Nor  does  he  ob- 
ject if  they  say  that  he  is  materializing  mind.  His  ulti- 
mate object,  he  contends,  is  to  show  that  there  is  no 
real  conflict  between  mind  and  matter,  since  one  sub- 
stance may  admit  of  the  properties  of  both,  if  that 
substance  be  characterized  by  active  powers  and  impene- 
trability. 

Such  is  the  doctrine  of  anthropological  materialism. 
It  appeared  so  novel  to  most  Americans  that  it  was  little 
appreciated  and  less  understood.  In  spite  of  the  author's 
friendship  with  Franklin  and  with  Jefferson,  and  in 
spite  of  his  seeking  in  America  a  refuge  for  free  thought, 
this  Priestleyanism,  as  it  was  called,  was  violently  at- 
tacked. For  example,  these  three  inferences  were  drawn 
from  the  supposition  that  the  whole  human  constitution 
was  made  up  of  one  homogeneous  substance;  first,  that 
there  is  no  distinction  between  the  soul  of  man  and  the 
body;  second,  that  the  idea  of  the  natural  immortality 
of  the  soul  is  wholly  fallacious;  and  third,  that  the 
properties  of  sensation  and  thought  must  be  extinguished 


162  MATExlIALISM 

by  the  dissolution  of  the  organized  mass  in  which  they 
exist.  To  explain  the  unpopularity  of  Priestleyanism 
we  need  only  point  out  how  these  inferences  ran  counter 
to  current  beliefs.  The  first  was  against  the  dualism  of 
the  day.  The  second  was  against  the  prevalent  hope 
that  the  soul  is  by  nature  indestructible.  The  third  im- 
plied a  belief  in  pantheism.  Now,  of  these  three  doc- 
trines it  is  clear  that  the  first  two  were  opposed  to  the 
past,  and  the  third  was  an  anticipation  of  the  future. 
For  their  doctrine  of  dualism,  the  men  of  the  eighteenth 
century  looked  back  to  the  authority  of  Descartes.  For 
the  doctrine  of  natural  immortality,  they  relied  upon  the 
Christian  tradition.  These  were  positive  factors  against 
which  Priestley  had  to  contend.  Finally,  the  coming  na- 
tive form  of  pantheism,  the  doctrine  of  an  immanent 
world-soul,  had  not  yet  received  clear  expression.  It 
remained  for  Emerson  to  brush  away  the  difficulties 
that  were  offered  by  a  world  of  apparently  passive 
matter. 

Priestley's  system  was  carried  from  Pennsylvania 
into  the  South  by  his  son-in-law,  Thomas  Cooper.  In 
spite  of  his  ingenuity,  this  companion  of  the  great 
chemist  had  a  personality  which  antagonized  the  public. 
He  was  attacked  by  the  clergy  when  proposed  by  Jeffer- 
son as  first  professor  of  natural  science  and  law  in  the 
University  of  Virginia.  He  was  indicted  in  Pennsyl- 
vania for  his  violent  writings  against  the  Federal  party. 
Finally  he  engaged  in  the  nullification  agitation  in  South 
Carolina.  In  short,  he  was  a  living  example  of  his  own 
doctrine  of  nervous  irritability.  He  had,  however,  one 
advantage  over  Priestley  in  his  wider  knowledge  of  the 
literature  of  materialism  from  Blount  to  Broussais. 
Thereby  he  is  able  to  show  that  Priestley's  historic 
method  was  as  diffused  and  porous  as  that  homogeneous 


JOSEPH  PRIESTLEY  103 

matter  for  which  he  contended.  So.  too,  in  his  View 
of  the  Metaphysical  and  Physiological  Arguments  in 
Favar  of  Materialism  he  is  able  to  state  the  arguments 
on  both  sides  in  a  way  that  his  okler  colleague  could  not. 
Thus,  he  shows  that  the  prime  argument  for  immaterial- 
ism  is,  that  from  matter  and  motion  nothing  but  matter 
and  motion  can  result.  Hence  life  and  the  properties 
connected  with  it  must  have  been  originally  impressed 
by  that  being  to  whom  all  creation  is  to  be  ascribed. 
But  this  statement,  which  favors  creationism.  Cooper 
cannot  accept.  He  therefore  takes  up  another  line  of 
reasoning  in  favor  of  his  doctrine:  The  chief  meta- 
physical argument  is  that  one  thing  is  the  property 
of  another  because  of  the  universality  in  which  they 
accompany  each  other.  Such  is  the  necessary  connection 
between  the  nervous  system  of  animals  and  the  proper- 
ties of  sensation  and  of  perception.  These  properties 
are  inseparable,  for  no  one  can  explain  how  the  im- 
material soul  can  act  on  a  material  body,  witliout  hav- 
ing one  property  in  common  with  it.  But  let  the 
soul  have  no  property  in  common  with  matter,  then 
neither  can  act  upon  the  other,  else  one  might  conceive 
of  erecting  the  Coliseum  of  Rome  by  playing  Haydn's 
Rondeau. 

Cooper  next  turns  from  metaphysics  to  physiology. 
We  need  not  resort,  he  continues,  to  the  doctrine  of 
some  distinct  and  superadded  being,  such  as  the  in- 
tellectual, sensitive,  or  vital  soul  of  the  ancients,  since 
that  would  give  an  immortal  soul  to  an  opossum  or  an 
oyster.  Nor  need  we  resort  to  some  being  of  analogous 
existence  to  the  immaterial  soul  of  the  orthodox,  for,  if 
the  seat  of  the  soul  be  in  the  medullary  substance,  then 
has  it  all  the  properties  of  matter.  On  the  contrary, 
all  the  mental  phenomena  are  explicable  as  phenomena 


104  MATERIALISM 

of  the  body,  or  attributable  to  the  nature  of  the  society 
in  which  we  are  thrown.  For  example,  a  man  born  and 
educated  in  Constantinople  will  have  one  set  of  im- 
pressions and  associations,  and  a  man  with  a  similar 
arrangement  of  nervous  apparatus,  bom  among  the 
Quakers  of  Philadelphia,  will  have  another.  All  this 
is  the  result  of  generating  causes  extraneous  to  the 
system. 

In  this  emphasis  on  the  external  or  environmental, 
Cooper  strikes  a  fresh  note,  for  when  he  says  that  the 
intellectual  faculties  vary  with  education  and  with 
habitual  difference  in  the  stimuli  applied,  he  is  approach- 
ing the  coming  doctrine  of  plasticity.  This  is  a  valuable 
addition  to  the  doctrine  of  homogeneity.  It  brings  in 
the  principle  of  differentiation.  Granted  that  man  is  of 
one  substance  and  that  there  is  a  like  nature  among  men, 
how  are  we  to  account  for  the  varieties  among  races? 
Cooper  was  on  the  verge  of  the  new  evolutionary  theories. 
What  Lamarck  was  doing  in  France,  he  had  a  chance  to 
do  in  America,  but  it  remained  for  another  thinker  of 
South  Carolina  to  carry  out  the  principles  of  environ- 
ment to  a  logical  conclusion.  It  was  not  Thomas  Cooper 
but  Joseph  Leidy  whom  Charles  Darwin  acknowledged 
to  have  anticipated,  in  a  measure,  the  principle  of  natu- 
ral selection.  That  principle,  as  a  partial  resultant  of 
materialism,  w^e  shall  recur  to  later. 

3.    Benjamin  Rush,  and  Mental  Healing 

In  Dr.  Benjamin  Rush  of  Philadelphia  we  have  the 
most  notable  of  the  American  medical  materialists  of 
the  eighteenth  century.  His  reputation  was  due  not  so 
much  to  the  high  offices  he  held,  such  as  that  of  physician- 
general  of  the  Continental  Army  and  professor  of  the 


BENJAMIN  RUSH,  AND  MENTAL  HEALING    105 

institutes  of  medicine  in  the  new  University  of  Penn- 
sylvania, as  to  his  anticipations  of  modem  thought. 
As  a  metaphysician  he  is  at  times  weak,  but  as  a  phj'si- 
cian  he  shows  himself  cognizant  of  such  difficult  dis- 
coveries as  the  cure  of  mental  disorders  by  suggestion. 
He  has  been  called  the  father  of  psychiatry  in  America. 
That  is  a  true  description,  for  his  whole  life  was  filled 
with  speculations  as  to  the  practical  application  of 
mental  medicine.  These  speculations  began  with  his 
early  work,  the  Influence  of  Physical  Causes  upon  the 
Maral  Faculty.  At  that  time  the  mental  faculty  was 
considered  something  apart  from  the  physical.  It  was 
a  faculty  which  had  a  high  office,  as  it  never  mingled 
with  the  material.  Indeed,  the  moral  sense  was  so 
sublimated  that  it  was  made  almost  unreal.  It  was  an 
intuition,  an  instinct,  mysterious  in  its  movements. 
Rush  changed  all  this.  He  showed  that  the  moral 
faculty  could  be  treated  in  a  scientific  way.  It  was  not 
like  a  sensitive  plant,  acting  without  reflection;  it  was 
rather  something  subject  to  physical  influences.  This 
conception,  of  course,  ran  counter  to  current  beliefs.  It 
seemed  to  be  a  base  materializing  of  a  lofty  spiritual 
principle.  To  meet  this  prejudice  Rush  attacks  the 
problem  in  the  form  of  an  indirect  question :  Do  we 
observe  a  connection  between  the  intellectual  faculties 
and  the  degrees  of  consistency  and  firmness  of  the  brain 
in  infancy  and  childhood?  The  same  connection  has 
been  observed  between  the  strength  and  the  prog- 
ress of  the  moral  faculty  in  children.  Do  we  observe 
instances  of  a  total  want  of  memory,  imagination,  and 
judgment,  either  from  an  original  defect  in  the  stamina 
of  the  brain,  or  from  the  influence  of  phj^sical  causes? 
The  same  unnatural  defect  has  been  ob.servcd.  and  prob- 
ably from  the  same  causes,  of  a  moral  faculty.    A  nerv- 


106  MATERIALISM 

oils  fover  may  cause  the  loss  not  only  of  memory  but 
of  the  habit  of  veracity.  The  former  is  called  amnesia, 
the  latter  unnamed  malady  will  compel  a  woman,  be  she 
even  in  easy  circumstances,  to  fill  her  pocket  secretly 
with  bread  at  the  table  of  a  friend. 

In  this  judicious  parallel  drawn  between  the  physical 
and  the  psychical,  we  see  Rush's  method  of  approach 
upon  the  dark  things  of  the  mind.     That  these  things 
were  dark;  that  the  mental  operations  are  mysterious, 
the  physician  grants  when  he  confesses  that,  in  ventur- 
ing on  this  untrodden  ground,  he  feels  like  ^neas  when 
he  was  about  to  enter  the  gates  of  Avernus,  but  without 
the  Sibyl  to  instruct  him  in  the  mysteries  before  him. 
In  order  to  clear  up  these  winding  subterranean  ways, 
he  throws  the  clear  light  of  definition  on  his  pages.    In 
the  case  of  mental  derangements  he  begins  by  making  a 
definite  list  of  the  aberrations  of  the  mind.     Thus  a 
weakened  action  of  the  moral  faculty  is  called  micro- 
nomia,  its  total  absence  anomia.     These  are  technical 
terms.    They  are  mere  names.    But,  beside  them,  Rush 
offers   real   explanations.     These   aberrations,   he  says, 
may  be  caused  not  only  by  madness  and  hysteria,  but 
also  by  all  those  states  of  the  body  which  are  accom- 
panied by  preternatural  irritability,  sensibility,  torpor, 
stupor,  or  mobility  of  the  nervous  system.    It  is  vain,  he 
continues,  to  attack  these  accompanying  vices,  whether  of 
the  body  or  of  the  mind,  with  lectures  upon  morality. 
They  are  only  to  be  cured  by  medicine  and  proper  treat- 
ment.    Thus  the  young  woman  that  lost  her  habit  of 
veracity  by  a  nervous  fever,  recovered  this  virtue  as  soon 
as  her  system  recovered  its  natural  tone.    Furthermore, 
it  makes  no  difference  whether  the  physical  causes  that 
are  to  be  enumerated  act  upon  the  moral  faculty  through 
the  medium  of  the  senses,  the  passions  and  memory,  or 


BENJAMIN  RUSH,  AND  MENTAL  HEALING     107 

the  imagination.  Their  action  is  eqiiallj"  certain  whether 
they  act  as  remote,  predisposing,  or  occasional  causes. 
For  instance,  the  state  of  the  weather  has  an  unfriendly- 
effect  upon  the  moral  sensibility,  as  seen  in  the  gloomy 
November  fogs  of  England ;  so  does  extreme  hunger,  as 
in  the  case  of  the  Indians  of  this  country,  who  thus  whet 
their  appetite  for  that  savage  species  of  warfare  pecu- 
liar to  them.  Again,  the  influence  of  association  upon 
morals  is  strong.  Suicide  is  often  propagated  by  the 
newspapers  and  monstrous  crimes  by  the  publication 
of  court  proceedings.  And  as  physical  causes  influ- 
ence moral,  so  do  they  influence  religious  principles. 
Religious  melancholy  and  madness  will  yield  more  readily 
to  medicine  than  simply  to  polemical  discourses  or  casu- 
istical advice. 

A  treatment  such  as  this  for  moral  lapses  must  have 
shocked  the  community.  Discourses  upon  morality  had 
hitherto  been  the  cure  for  those  lapses.  So  it  seemed  to 
degrade  these  advices  to  say  that  a  chief  influence  was 
that  of  physical  causes.  Rush  realized  that  an  objection 
would  be  raised  from  his  being  supposed  to  favor  the 
materiality  of  the  soul.  He  meets  the  objection  by  say- 
ing that  he  does  not  see  that  his  doctrine  obliges  us  to 
decide  upon  the  question  of  the  nature  of  the  soul. 
Still  he  cannot  help  giving  his  own  opinion  as  a  ma- 
terialist, and  boldly  states  that  matter  is  in  its  own 
nature  as  immortal  as  spirit. 

Rush's  well-known  essay  on  the  Influence  of  Physical 
Causes  upon  the  Moral  Faculty  was  followed  in  the  last 
year  of  the  century  by  another  upon  the  same  influ- 
ences in  promoting  an  increase  of  strength  and  activity 
of  the  intellectual  faculties  of  man.  This  treatise,  which 
was  delivered  as  an  introductorj-  lecture  to  Rush's  stu- 
dents in  medicine,  is  a  model  of  its  kind.     It  is  clear 


> 


108  MATERIALISM 

and  intelligible ;  it  is  scientific  and  practical.  In  a  happy- 
analogy  he  helps  out  the  undergraduate  in  grasping  the 
mysteries  of  the  mind.  The  faculties,  he  says,  may  be 
compared  to  a  well-organized  government:  the  memory 
and  imagination  to  the  House  of  Representatives,  the 
understanding  to  the  Senate,  in  which  the  transactions 
of  the  House  of  Representatives  are  examined,  the  moral 
faculties  to  the  Courts  of  Justice,  the  conscience  to  the 
Court  of  Appeals. 

At  this  point  the  Philadelphian  begins  his  fruitful 
study  of  abnormal  mentality.  This  study  is  based  on  the 
safe  doctrine  of  the  co-ordinate  value  of  the  physical 
and  psychical.  Those  dreams  and  phantasms  and  sup- 
posed voices  which  have  been  superstitiously  ascribed 
to  supernatural  influences,  the  physician  now  explains 
in  a  natural  way.  For  instance,  unfavorable  changes 
discovered  in  diseases  in  the  morning  are  often  the  effect 
occasioned  by  the  disturbing  dreams  of  the  night  before, 
while  the  pain  of  a  surgical  operation  is  often  lessened 
by  telling  the  patient  that  the  worst  part  of  it  has  been 
performed.  A  reference  like  the  last  is  remarkable 
for  that  day  and  generation.  It  was  the  principle  of 
suggestive  anesthesia  stated  some  forty  years  before 
the  application  of  material  anjestheties  in  America.  The 
former  principle  Rush  had  not  as  yet  developed,  for  it 
was  now  his  purpose  to  render  the  general  science  of 
mind  a  more  exact  science.  He  disparages  metaphysics 
as  consisting  only  of  words  without  ideas,  of  definitions 
of  nonentities.  In  its  place  he  would  put  the  stress 
upon  the  physical  science  of  the  mind,  for  which  he  asks 
to  be  allowed  to  coin  the  word  phrenology.  This  was 
another  anticipation.  A  decade  before  the  word  was 
used  by  Europeans — the  American  applied  it  to  ex- 
plain dreams.     For  example,  he  stated  that  whatever 


BENJAMIN  RUSH,  AND  MENTAL  HEALING     109 

part  of  the  brain  is  affected,  tlie  dream  that  takes  place 
is  of  that  nature;  different  parts  of  the  brain  being 
allotted  to  the  different  faculties  and  operations  of  the 
mind.  Thus,  if  the  moral  part  is  affected,  we  dream  of 
committing  crime,  at  the  very  thought  of  which  we 
shudder  when  awake. 

We  shall  see  later  how  phrenology  was  rendered  ridic- 
ulous by  misuse.  At  this  point  we  may  only  note  that 
Rush  used  it  in  the  sensible  way  of  brain  localization. 
His  suggestions  of  this  period  were  supplemented  by 
more  exact  descriptions  of  mental  derangements  in 
some  remarkable  little  papers  on  the  "  Different 
Species  of  Phobia  and  Mania."  Among  the  former  are 
instanced  the  cat-phobia,  and  the  solo-phobia,  the  phobia 
being  well  defined  as  a  fear  of  an  imaginary  evil,  or  an 
undue  fear  of  a  real  one.  Troubles  like  these  may  be 
cured,  asserts  the  doctor.  To  compose  and  regulate 
the  passion,  there  are  to  be  found  means  ranging  from 
the  physical  influence  of  music  to  the  removal  of  painful 
associations  of  ideas,  as  when  a  fever,  got  while  out 
gunning,  was  cured  bj^  removing  the  gun  from  the  ill 
man's  room.  So  much  for  the  psychical  side;  the  physi- 
cal is  now  expanded  in  the  statement  that  all  operations 
in  the  mind  are  the  effects  of  motions  previously  ex- 
cited in  the  brain,  and  every  idea  and  thought  appears 
to  depend  upon  a  motion  peculiar  to  itself.  A  state- 
ment like  this  might  almost  be  counted  a  rough  formula- 
tion of  the  modern  theory  of  psyeho-physieal  parallel- 
ism. At  the  least,  it  is  a  practical  working  hypothesis, 
or,  as  Rush  puts  it,  a  system  of  principles  that  shall 
lead  to  general  success  in  the  treatment  of  the  diseases 
of  the  mind. 

This  last  phrase  is  the  title  of  the  work  which  gives 
to  Rush  his  chief  claim  to  fame.     In  it  the  American 


110  MATERIALISM 

alienist  seeks  to  discover  tlie  various  causes  of  intel- 
lectual derangements.  Briefly  put,  these  are  of  two 
classes:  first,  those  that  act  directly  upon  the  body,  as 
malconformations  and  lesions  of  the  brain ;  second,  those 
that  act  indirectly  upon  the  body  through  the  medium 
of  the  mind,  as  intense  study  over  the  means  of  dis- 
covering perpetual  motion,  or  even  researches  into  the 
meaning  of  certain  biblical  prophecies.  Rush  next  takes 
up  the  difficult  subject  of  the  derangement  of  the  will, 
in  which  subject  he  is  declared  to  have  led  his  genera- 
tion and  forecasted  the  later  work  of  the  French  school. 
At  this  time  he  was  in  touch  with  the  Gallic  specula- 
tions for  the  treatment  of  such  a  negative  affection  of 
the  will  as  aboulia,  or  what  he  would  call  a  debility  or 
torpor,  or  loss  of  all  sensibility  to  the  stimulus  of  mo- 
tives. This  disorder  may  be  cured  in  two  ways:  From 
the  physical  side  he  has  been  informed  by  his  friend 
Brissot  that  animal  magnetism  will  cure  like  cases; 
for  himself  he  prefers  the  psychical  remedy,  what  we 
would  now  call  mental  suggestion.  In  fact,  he  actually 
anticipates  the  modem  formula  of  the  will  to  believe 
when  he  states,  that  a  palsy  of  the  limbs  has  been  cured 
by  the  cry  of  fire,  and  a  dread  of  being  burned.  Why, 
he  asks,  should  not  a  palsy  of  the  will  be  cured  in  a 
similar  manner?  There  is  a  more  subtle  mental  dis- 
order connected  with  that  of  the  will,  it  is  a  palsy  of 
the  believing  faculty.  For  this  form  of  a  weak  mental  di- 
gestion. Rush's  treatment  is  to  go  back  to  a  plain  in- 
tellectual diet.  If  the  will  to  believe  is  deficient,  the 
remedy  should  consist  in  putting  propositions  of  the 
most  simple  nature  to  the  mind,  and  after  gaining  assent 
to  them,  to  rise  to  propositions  of  a  more  difficult  nature. 
That  the  mind  is  capable  of  re-education  is  now  seen 
in  a  negative  way.    Just  as  there  are  various  forms  of  a 


I 


BENJAMIN  RUSH,  AND  MENTAL  HEALING     111 

weak  will,  so  are  there  of  a  weak  raemor5^  There  may 
be  an  oblivion  of  names  and  vocables,  or  of  the  sounds 
of  words,  but  not  of  the  letters  which  compose  them,  of 
the  qualities  or  numbers  of  the  most  familiar  objects, 
of  events,  time,  and  place.  These  different  varieties 
of  forgetfulness  are  summed  up  in  the  remarkable 
case  of  an  Italian  victim  of  yellow  fever,  who,  in  the 
beginning  of  his  malady  spoke  only  English,  in  the 
middle  only  French,  and  on  the  day  of  his  death  only 
the  language  of  his  native  country.  And  just  as  there  is 
a  discontinuous  memory  in  fevers,  so  there  may  be  a 
continuous  memory  in  trances.  Here  was  a  hint  of  the 
later  French  discoveries  that  by  means  of  subconscious 
states  it  is  possible  to  patch  up  the  lost  recollections  of 
the  normal  conscience  into  an  unbroken  secondary  series. 
To  Rush  the  best  instance  of  this  so-called  dual  personal- 
ity is  somnambulism.  Somnambulists,  he  asserts,  recol- 
lect in  each  fit  what  they  did  in  the  preceding  one. 
They  appear  to  have  two  distinct  minds,  but  he  in- 
quires, may  this  not  be  owing  to  impressions  made  on 
the  other  parts  of  the  brain  and  excited  by  the  same 
stimulus  ? 

It  is  unfortunate  that  the  Philadelphia  physician  did 
not  have  an  opportunity  to  work  on  such  interesting 
cases  as  these.  He  complains  that  such  abnormal  experi- 
ences are  commonly  considered  to  be  supernatural  and 
that  people  are  averse  to  having  them  treated  in  a  sci- 
entific way.  At  that  time  there  was  little  field  for  the 
application  of  Rush 's  theories  outside  of  his  own  private 
patients,  with  a  single  exception.  That  exception  re- 
ferred to  what  he  calls  his  system  of  Christian  juris- 
prudence, in  which  he  tried  to  apply  to  public  institu- 
tions like  the  Philadelphia  jail  the  principles  of  a 
merciful   mental   healing.     In   a   final   passage,   which 


112  MATERIALISM 

anticipates  by  a  full  century  the  modern  treatment  of 
the  criminal  insane,  Rush  speaks  thus  feelingly: 

It  would  be  as  absurd  to  inflict  the  punishment  of  death  upon 
a  fellow  creature  for  taking  away  a  Hfe  under  a  deranged 
state  of  the  will,  as  for  a  surgeon  to  cut  off  an  arm  or  a 
leg  because  in  its  convulsive  motions  it  injured  a  toilet  or 
overset  a  tea  table.  Now,  while  these  morbid  operations  of 
the  will  may  include  in  their  consequences  even  theft  and 
murder,  yet  they  are  to  be  considered,  not  as  vices,  but  as 
symptoms  of  a  disease.  Therefore,  for  persons  thus  afflicted 
legislators  should  abolish  the  punishment  of  death,  cropping, 
branding,  and  public  whipping,  and  substitute  for  them  con- 
finement, labour,  simple  diet,  cleanliness,  and  affectionate 
treatment.  As  is  shown  by  the  moral  effects  thus  produced  in 
the  jail  of  Philadelphia,  the  reformation  of  criminals  and  the 
prevention  of  crimes  can  be  better  effected  by  livmg  than  by 
dead  examples! 

It  is  somewhat  of  a  problem  to  find  out  why  with  such 
a  good  foundation  for  mental  healing  in  America,  the 
subject  was  not  properly  developed.  To  obtain  a  solu- 
tion we  shall  have  to  make  a  drag-net  of  generaliza- 
tion. There  were  two  schools  in  the  country  which 
were  destined  to  have  different  opinions  about  the  rela- 
tions of  mind  and  body.  Following  Rush's  example,  we 
find  the  Philadelphia  school  emphasizing  the  reciprocal 
influences  of  the  physical  and  psychical.  Thus,  Provost 
Beasley  of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania  asserted  that 
in  every  case  in  which  there  is  performed  an  operation 
of  the  mind,  there  takes  place,  at  the  same  time,  a  cor- 
respondent, correlative,  and  consentient  operation  of  the 
body.  Here  was  a  good  alliterative  anticipation  of  the 
formula  of  psycho-physical  parallelism,  in  which  the 
.  material  side  of  human  nature  is  given  its  due.  Now 
we  can  say  that  this  just  balance  was  owing  to  the 
influence  of  the  English  materialists  Ilobbes  and  Hart- 


BENJAMIN  RUSH,  AND  MENTAL  HEALING     113 

ley,  Darwin  and  Priestley,  and  the  French  materialists 
from  Holbach  to  Cabanis. 

Over  against  the  Southern  followers  of  these  material- 
ists we  may  put  the  immaterialists  of  New  England  and 
the  North.  These  were  the  followers  of  Cudworth  and 
Norris,  of  Berkeley  and  Edwards.  They  emphasized  the 
principles  of  pure  reason  at  the  expense  of  the  principles 
of  physiology.  They  were  descendants  of  ascetic  Puri- 
tans and  so  attempted  to  live  on  supersensible  realities. 
Moreover,  Plato  being  their  spiritual  father,  they  sought 
to  disparage  the  body  and  to  cure  the  ills  of  the  flesh 
by  denying  their  real  existence.  They  were  so  bent  on 
cultivating  the  inner  self,  that  they  neglected  the  bodily 
self.  Emerson  himself  said  of  this  kind  of  transcen- 
dentalism, that  it  was  the  Saturnalia  or  excess  of  faith, 
wanting  the  restraining  grace  of  common  sense. 

From  this  point  there  stretch  before  us  two  diverging 
lines  of  possible  development.  For  reasons  to  be  ex- 
plained later,  Americans  did  not  try  to  strike  a  balance 
between  these  lines,  but  flew  off  on  two  tangents.  One 
group  leaned  toward  the  materialistic  side,  another  to  the 
idealistic.  Among  the  former  were  the  mesmerists,  the 
phrenologists,  the  electro-biologists.  Among  the  latter 
were  the  spiritualists  and  so-called  new  thoughters.  A 
rational  development  in  the  materialistic  direction  was 
blocked  by  an  unfortunate  revival  of  some  crude  theories 
of  the  olden  time  and  the  exaggerations  of  these  theories 
in  the  form  of  animal  magnetism.  It  will  be  recalled 
that  old-fashioned  English  corporealists.  like  Thomas 
Ilobbes.  believed  tl.at  the  gap  between  mind  and  matter 
could  be  passed  over  by  means  of  the  animal  spirits 
which  were  thought  of  as  so  many  volatile  gases  in  a 
retort, — subtle  and  invisible  fluids  similar  to  the  prod- 
ucts  of   the   alchemist's  distillation.     These   good  old- 


114  MATERIALISM 

fashioned  spirits  were  united  with  the  late  eighteenth- 
centuiy  notions  regarding  the  electric  fluid,  and  thus 
was  obtained  a  composite  elastic  and  electric  fluid.  This 
had  a  twofold  function.  As  an  elastic  fluid  it  was  the 
medium  of  communication  between  the  individual's 
brain  and  his  body.  As  an  electric  fluid  it  could  be  pro- 
jected beyond  the  limits  of  the  individual;  thus  arose 
thought-transference,  clairvoyance,  and  mental  healing, 
both  local  and  long-distance. 

So  far,  we  have  merely  an  Anglo-American  combina- 
tion of  Hobbism  and  Franklinism.  This  w^as  made  more 
potent  by  being  rendered  occult.  The  French  came  in 
and  mesmerism  aided  the  medical  theory  by  means  of 
physical  affluxes  and  the  magnetic-sympathetic  system 
of  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries.  It  is  strange 
how  theories  from  different  countries  were  united  in  the 
notorious  movement  called  animal  magnetism.  The  ball 
was  started  rolling  in  America  by  Franklin  himself,  al- 
though he  came  later  to  stop  it.  The  invention  of  the 
lightning  conductor  stimulated  the  popular  imagination 
by  rendering  the  marvelous  probable.  Now  there  was 
palpable  proof  of  the  electric  fluid  as  subtle  and  uni- 
versally diffused  and  this  seemed  to  corroborate  the 
theory  of  Mesmer  that  there  was  a  radiation  from  all 
things,  but  especially  from  the  stars,  magnets,  and  hu- 
man bodies,  of  a  force  which  could  act  in  all  things 
else  and  which  was  in  each  case  directed  by  the  indwell- 
ing spirit.  This  was  Mesmer 's  theoretical  postulate. 
His  practical  achievement  consisted  in  application  of 
these  occult  doctrines  in  the  way  of  psycho-therapeutics. 
He  took  hold  of  the  so-called  universal  radiating  fluid 
and  applied  it  to  the  sick  by  means  of  contacts  and 
passes.  When  he  claimed  that  he  could  effect  cures  irre- 
spective of  age,  temperament,  and  sex,  it  can  be  seen 


BENJAMIN  RUSH,  AND  MENTAL  HEALING     115 

how  his  practice  became  a  scandal.  At  last  Franklin  had 
his  revenge  for  the  misuse  of  his  scientific  views.  When 
the  French  king  appointed  royal  commissioners  to  in- 
vestigate mesmerism,  the  name  of  the  American  am- 
bassador headed  the  list.  That  Franklin's  common  sense 
was  outraged  by  the  claims  of  the  mesmerists  appears 
from  the  severe  language  of  the  royal  report.  It  con- 
cluded as  follows :  ' '  The  commissioners  have  ascertained 
that  the  animal  magnetic  fluid  is  not  perceptible  by 
any  of  the  senses ;  that  it  has  no  action,  either  on  them- 
selves or  on  the  patients  subjected  to  it.  They  are  con- 
vinced that  pressure  and  contact  effect  changes  which 
are  rarely  favorable  to  the  animal  system,  and  which 
injuriously  affect  the  imagination.  Finally,  thoy  have 
demonstrated  by  decisive  experiments  that  imagination 
apart  from  magnetism  produces  convulsions,  and  that 
magnetism  without  imagination  produces  nothing." 

The  effect  of  these  strictures  upon  the  fate  of  imma- 
terialism  in  America  can  be  imagined.  Franklin's  name 
carried  great  weight  and  his  countrymen  so  trusted  him 
that  they  did  not  question  his  criticism.  In  a  w^ay,  it 
is  an  historical  calamity  that  in  this  famous  report  the 
kernel  of  truth  was  lost  in  the  heap  of  rubbish.  Under- 
neath ]\resmer's  talk  about  passes  and  contacts  and  com- 
plicated apparatus  of  tractors  there  lay  the  true  prin- 
ciple of  suggestion,  namely,  that  through  suggestion  the 
subject  may  regain  his  nervous  stability,  relieve  him- 
self of  mental  overtension,  and  so  tone  up  the  system  as 
to  hasten  the  process  of  cure. 

Animal  magnetism,  with  its  good  and  its  evil,  was  kept 
out  of  the  country  for  a  full  generation.  It  came  in 
again,  not  by  means  of  legitimate  practitioners,  but  by 
means  of  quacks  and  extremists.  The  first  of  these  was 
Charles  Poyen,  who  had  been  "  cured  mesmerically"  of 


116  MATERIALISM 

a  nervous  disorder,  and  in  1837  published  his  Progress 
of  Animal  Magnetism  in  New  England.  In  the  same 
year  came  Duraut's  Exposition,  or  a  New  Theory  of 
Animal  Magnetism  with  a  Key  to  the  Mysteries.  In  this 
animal  magnetism  is  declared  to  be  a  branch  of  elec- 
tricity, a  science  which  gives  a  new  life  to  the  religious 
principle,  creates  a  new  method  of  pathological  investi- 
gation, and  settles  therapeutics  on  a  basis  hitherto  un- 
known to  the  medical  world. 

Finally,  there  came  a  localized  form  of  mesmerism, 
Dr.  Grimes's  electro-biology,  which  started  the  whole 
tribe  of  Yankee  magnetic  healers.  This  is  not  the  place 
to  show  how  this  exaggerated  materialism  was  turned 
into  a  propaganda  among  the  pious.  It  would  lead  to  a 
long  digression  to  explain  that  incredible  American  mix- 
ture of  religion  and  medicine  which  has  been  noted  by 
foreign  observers.  It  is  enough  to  say  that  we  did  not 
have  the  good  fortune  of  France,  where  certain  physi- 
cians took  up  the  subject  scientifically  and  developed 
out  of  the  magical  beliefs  of  Mesmer  the  real  phenomena 
of  hypnotism,  hysteria,  and  suggestion.  Nor  have  we 
time  to  more  than  suggest  the  direction  of  the  other 
line  of  development  of  mental  medicine.  In  that  diverg- 
ing wedge  of  early  tendencies  the  immaterialistic  side, 
the  line  of  emphasis  upon  the  spiritual  was  apparently 
lost.  The  fact  was,  it  was  only  latent,  for  the  idealistic 
emphasis  upon  the  primacy  of  mind  lay  dormant  in 
American  thought.  It  was  last  seen  in  the  works  of 
Johnson  and  Edwards.  It  did  not  reappear  during  the 
course  of  deism,  nor  that  of  materialism.  It  only  came 
to  life  again  when  the  warmth  of  the  transcendental 
movement  reached  it.  In  Emerson  we  find  a  constant 
appeal  to  self-reliance,  to  the  ability  of  the  mind  to 
comfort  itself  against  the  adversities  of  life. 


BENJAMIN  RUSH,  AND  MENTAL  HEALING     117 

Self-reliance  and  the  supremacy  of  the  spiritual — 
these  two  tenets  of  Emerson  suffice  to  explain  the  re- 
vival of  immaterialistic  mental  healing  in  our  day. 
Just  as  the  earlier  idealism  of  colonial  times  was 
thwarted  in  its  growth  by  such  events  as  the  war  of  in- 
dependence and  the  conquests  of  the  English  colonies,  so 
the  idealism  of  the  nineteenth  century  was  thwarted  by 
another  war,  and  a  further  conquest  of  the  continent. 
But  the  longing  of  the  native  mind  for  the  super- 
sensible; the  true  mystic  conviction  that  spirit  can  con- 
quer matter — if  that  be  considered  as  dull,  dead,  inert — 
that  conviction  never  died.  It  has  again  come  to  life 
and  we  have  an  immaterialism  of  the  present  day  with 
works  which  range  in  value  from  Hudson's  Laws  of 
Psychic  Phenomena  to  AVilliam  James's  Energies  of 
Men  and  the  Will  to  Believe. 

We  have  left  the  two  lines  of  mental  healing  in 
America  at  their  widest  point  of  divergence.  On  the 
one  hand  there  was  the  extreme  materialistic  view  which 
emphasized  the  bodily  function.  On  the  other  hand, 
there  is  the  current  emphasis  on  the  psychical.  At  pres- 
ent the  prevailing  tendency  is  to  appeal  to  supernumer- 
ary powers  of  the  mind  such  as  the  subconscious.  This 
is  the  side  taken  up  by  the  laity  and  one  in  which  the 
regular  medical  profession  takes  comparatively  slight 
interest.  For  a  just  development  of  the  two  sides,  the 
lines  must  be  drawn  nearer  together.  It  is  desirable 
that  in  our  medical  schools  we  should  return  to  the  prac- 
tice of  Dr.  Rush  of  a  century  and  a  half  ago,  which 
means  that  a  student  should  be  required  to  study  psy- 
chology in  connection  with  physiology.  This  would  seem 
to  promise  a  correction  of  extravagances  and  to  lead  back 
to  the  old  principle  of  the  Philadelphia  school,  that  there 
is  a  co-ordinate  value  in  the  study  of  mind  and  body. 


CHAPTER  V 
REALISM 

1.   The  Scottish  Influences 

Natural  realism,  according  to  an  early  American 
exponent,  consists  in  the  doctrine  that  the  mind  per- 
ceives not  merely  the  ideas  or  images  of  external  ob- 
jects but  the  external  objects  themselves.  In  short, 
the  distinguishing  mark  of  such  metaphysics  is  an 
appeal  from  the  delusive  principles  of  the  idealism 
of  Berkeley  and  the  skepticism  of  Hume  to  the  com- 
mon sense  of  mankind  as  a  tribunal  paramount  to 
all  the  subtleties  of  philosophy.  This  is  the  defini- 
tion of  Samuel  Miller,  the  Princeton  historian  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  in  his  exposition  of  the  system  of 
Reid.  It  may  be  supplemented  by  a  defense  of  Presi- 
dent McCosh,  the  pupil  of  Hamilton,  two  genera- 
tions later.  Realism,  says  the  latter,  is  that  system 
which  holds  that  there  are  real  things  and  that  man 
can  know  them ;  that  we  have  no  need  to  resort  to 
such  theories  as  those  of  internal  ideas  or  occasional 
causes  coming  between  the  perceiving  mind  and  the  per- 
ceived objects;  but  that  the  mind  knows  directly  and 
intuitively  three  kinds  of  reality:  first,  matter,  whether 
existing  in  the  body  or  out  of  the  body  as  external,  ex- 
tended, and  resisting;  second,  the  perceiving  self  as 
thinking  or  willing,  a  reality  as  certain  and  definite  as 
matter,  but  perceived  by  self-consciousness  and  not  the 
external  senses;  third,  the  objects  perceived  by  our  con- 

118 


THE  SCOTTISH  INFLUENCES  119 

science  or  moral  perception,  the  higher  knowledge  of 
voluntary  acts  as  being  morally  good  or  evil. 

Such  is  that  natural  realism  which  has  been  claimed 
to  be  the  American  philosophy.  This  claim  is  true  if  one 
considers  realism's  rapid  growth,  its  wide  spread,  and 
its  tenacious  hold  upon  the  popular  mind.  Brought  in 
as  a  transatlantic  offshoot  of  the  Scotch  school,  it  over- 
ran the  country,  and  had  an  exclusive  and  preponderant 
influence  well  beyond  the  centennial  of  the  country's  in- 
dependence. For  this  astonishing  success  several  rea- 
sons have  been  given :  not  only  was  the  common  sense 
philosophy  of  Reid,  Stewart,  Brown,  and  Hamilton  in 
harmony  with  the  practical  note  of  the  country,  but  it 
was  also  an  aid  to  faith,  a  safeguard  to  morality  as 
against  the  skepticism  of  Hume  and  the  atheism  of  the 
Voltairians. 

But  there  are  further  reasons,  which  may  be  con- 
sidered from  two  points  of  view:  internally  as  intrinsic 
excellences;  externally  as  adventitious  aids.  Looked  at 
from  within,  natural  realism  is  claimed  to  possess  a 
unity  not  only  in  the  circumstances  that  its  expounders 
have  been  Scotchmen  but  also  in  its  method,  its  doctrine, 
and  its  spirit.  Its  method  is  that  of  observation  and 
induction,  and  not  of  analysis  and  deduction,  which 
explains  phenomena  by  mere  assumed  principles.  Its 
doctrine  is  that  of  self-consciousness  as  the  instrument  of 
observation,  and  not  the  mere  obser^-ation  of  the  brain 
or  nerves  which  tends  to  neglect  our  inward  experienee. 
Its  spirit  is  that  of  common  sense,  which,  by  direct 
awareness  and  not  by  a  chain  of  reasoning,  reaches  prin- 
ciples which  are  natural,  original,  and  necessary.  We 
shall  have  to  consider  later  if  these  points  are  really 
excellences. 

At  first  sight  natural  realism  makes  a  false  simplifica- 


120  REALISM 

tion  like  a  child's  picture  of  a  man,  and  the  adult 
realist's  mind  seems  to  work  more  easily  than  that  of  the 
child  once  portrayed  by  the  idealist.  "Without  looking 
further  from  within  we  must  now  consider  the  matter 
from  without.  Besides  intrinsic  excellences  there  were 
adventitious  aids  which  contributed  to  the  success  of  the 
movement.  First,  it  happened  to  fit  the  needs  of  educa- 
tional and  ecclesiastical  orthodoxy.  It  was  not,  as  in 
Scotland,  favored  by  the  union  of  church  and  state, 
but  by  the  peculiar  American  combination  of  church 
and  college.  Here  not  only  was  the  philosophy  of 
reality  convenient,  compact,  and  teachable,  appealing 
to  a  common  sense  of  which  every  youngster  had  some 
spark,  but  it  was  also  an  eminently  safe  philosophy 
which  kept  undergraduates  locked  in  so  many  intel- 
lectual dormitories,  safe  from  the  dark  speculations  of 
materialism  and  the  beguiling  allurements  of  idealism. 
Or,  as  the  details  have  been  given  by  another,  Hobbes, 
because  of  his  atomism,  was  considered  a  guide  to  athe- 
ism ;  Hume,  because  of  his  skepticism,  the  arch-enemy  of 
orthodoxy,  while  Berkeley  was  always  suspected  to  be  a 
leader  in  the  same  direction.  Therefore,  to  prevent  the 
undermining  of  the  faith,  college  professors  took  philos- 
ophy seriously  and  not  speculatively,  and  a  religious 
bias  helped  to  determine  the  hold  of  realism  in  educa- 
tion. 

A  second  cause  for  the  success  of  realism  lay  in  the 
organizations  upon  which  it  chanced  to  fasten.  In  its 
propaganda  it  used  most  of  the  denominational  colleges 
on  the  Atlantic  seaboard,  and  was  also  backed  by  the 
denominations  themselves.  Here  the  churches,  like  well- 
constructed  machines,  turned  out  uniform  sets  of  opin- 
ions all  fitting  the  same  mold  of  common  sense;  to  ob- 
tain many  men  of  one  mind,  the  Protestant  clergy  of 


THE  SCOTTISH  INFLUENCES  121 

these  times  were  practically  all  formed  from  the  Scotch 
pattern,  the  text-books  of  Reid  and  Stewart,  Bcattic 
and  Hamilton  coming  from  the  native  press  in  an  almost 
unbroken  series  of  editions,  A  third  cause  of  the  suc- 
cess of  realism  was  the  character  of  the  immigration 
into  the  country.  Between  the  Now  Englandcrs  and 
their  modiiied  Calvinism,  and  the  Southerners  with 
their  diluted  Arminianism,  there  came  a  wave  of  new 
settlers,  which  on  touching  the  American  shore  spread 
itself  more  widely  than  any  other.  The  Scotch-Irish, 
entering  chiefly  by  way  of  the  ports  of  the  Middle 
States,  carried  along  with  their  Presbyterian  connec- 
tions their  philosophy  of  common  sense.  To  trace  this 
movement  into  the  Alleghany  Mountains  and  down  the 
valleys  of  Virginia  and  of  the  Cumberland,  is  to  trace  a 
kind  of  intellectual  glacier,  an  overwhelming  mass  of 
cold  dogma  which  moved  slowly  southwards  and  ground 
out  all  opposition.  This  glacial  age  in  American  thought 
was  of  the  greatest  significance.  Because  of  it  deism  dis- 
appeared, save  in  the  tide-water  counties  where  planters 
of  English  blood  still  remained,  and  materialism  was 
wiped  out,  save  in  the  Gallicized  portions  of  the  country, 
such  as  the  Carolinas,  and  the  Bourbon  sections  of  Ken- 
tucky. 

That  the  union  of  church  and  college  was  a  fortuitous 
aid  to  the  spread  of  realism  is  clear  from  the  fate  of  its 
rivals.  Deism  lacked  new  blood  because  English  pioneers 
of  the  cultured  class  had  ceased  coming  to  the  countr}\ 
Idealism  languished  because  its  special  means  of  com- 
munication, the  Anglican  church,  was  practically  a  chan- 
nel cut  off;  few  scholars  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge,  no 
ecclesiastic  of  the  type  of  Berkeley  came  into  the  coun- 
tr>'  after  the  second  war  with  England.  But  it  was 
materialism  that  suffered  most  for  want  of  those  auxili- 


122  REALISM 

aries  under  which  realism  flourished.  As  compared  with 
realism  the  coutrast  is  striking.  Immigration  did  not 
help  it,  and  sparks  struck  out  by  men  like  Priestley  and 
Cooper  were  a  mere  flash  in  the  pan.  Nor  were  the 
colleges  of  much  avail ;  the  University  of  Pennsylvania 
by  political  mismanagement,  Transylvania  by  its  poverty 
and  remoteness,  and  the  University  of  Virginia  by  politi- 
cal complications,  were  together  rendered  inoperative  as 
aids  to  materialism.  Even  if  Jefferson's  late  conversion 
from  materialism  to  realism  had  been  known,  his  political 
affiliations  would  have  damaged  him  in  the  sight  of  the 
orthodox.  Thus,  by  way  of  contrast,  the  elder  Presi- 
dent Dwight  of  Yale  had  more  weight  in  the  scales  of 
orthodox  philosophy  than  the  President  of  the  United 
States  himself;  the  one  standing  for  respectable  federal- 
ism, the  other  for  infidel  democracy.  But  the  lack  of 
efficient  organization  was  the  great  drawback  to  the 
materialistic  cause.  Had  Jefferson  succeeded  in  found- 
ing his  central  society  after  the  model  of  the  French 
Academy,  had  there  been  anything  approaching  the 
Royal  Society  of  England  in  the  whole  land,  scientific 
investigations  like  those  of  Golden  and  of  Rush  might 
have  received  the  stamp  of  institutional  approval. 

If  these  are  mere  conjectures  as  to  what  might  have 
happened,  what  did  really  happen  was  that  materialism, 
left  to  itself  as  a  mere  speculative  movement,  practically 
disappeared  from  the  field  of  thought,  and  that  a  rival 
movement  which  was  backed  up  by  a  strong  organiza- 
tion, a  rigid  faith,  and  well-trained  agents,  with  all  its 
faults,  inconsistencies,  contradictions,  and  superficiali- 
ties, remained  as  the  dominant  force  in  the  field.  Such 
a  force  was  Scottish  realism,  which  held  the  Atlantic 
States  as  a  private  preserve  and  Princeton  College  as 
its  hunting  lodge. 


THE  PRINCETf  N  SCHf  f  L  123 

2,   The  Princeton  SciietL 

Traditionally  Princeton  is  committed  to  a  realistic 
metaphysics  as  opposed  to  agnosticism,  materialism,  or 
idealism.  This  is  the  opinion  of  one  of  its  historians  at 
the  one  hundred  and  fiftieth  anniversary  of  the  found- 
ing of  the  institution.  The  opinion  is  that  of  one  who 
takes  pride  in  an  air-tight  system ;  yet  it  has  the  advan- 
tage of  summing  up  the  early  history  of  the  college  as 
it  passed  through  successive  reactions  to  the  current 
phases  of  speculation.  First,  it  was  opposed  to  the  ag- 
nosticism of  extreme  deism,  considering  the  age  of  rea- 
son as  little  else  but  the  age  of  infidelity ;  next,  it  was 
opposed  to  materialism,  whether  that  meant  a  no-soul 
psychology  as  with  Buchanan,  or  a  reduction  of  psy- 
chology to  a  psyehologj"-  of  the  nerves  as  with  Cooper, 
or  an  identification  of  body  and  mind  as  with  Priestley. 
Lastly,  it  was  opposed  to  idealism  in  all  its  forms.  In 
place  of  the  mediate  perception  of  Berkeley,  Hume,  and 
Kant,  the  Scotch  intuition  puts  immediate  perception, 
a  direct  knowledge  of  real  qualities  in  things.  In  brief, 
the  Princeton  system  was  a  complete  dualism:  in  its 
cosmology,  between  the  world  and  deity;  in  its  psy- 
chology, between  soul  and  body;  in  its  epistemology, 
between  .subject  and  object. 

The  advantage  of  such  a  dualism  was  the  avoidance 
of  the  difficulty  of  trying  to  think  things  together.  Now 
this  accommodation  of  its  teaching  to  the  general  in- 
telligence led  realists  like  McCosh  to  claim  that  such 
a  natural  realism  as  was  taught  at  Princeton  was  what 
an  American  philosophy  should  be.  The  claim  may  be 
disputed,  yet  it  has  in  its  favor  the  fact  that  the  College 
of  New  Jersey,  from  its  verj^  foundation,  had  impressed 
upon  it  a  national  character,  inasmuch  as  it  was  not  the 


124  REALISM 

college  of  an  established  church,  nor  of  a  single  colony, 
nor  of  a  people  sprung  from  a  single  nationality,  but 
had  for  its  charter  an  undenominational  document,  for 
its  heads  graduates  of  Harvard  and  Yale,  Glasgow 
and  Edinburgh,  and  for  its  students  the  sons  of  Eng- 
lish Friends,  New  England  Puritans,  and  Presbyterians 
from  Scotland  and  Ireland.  But  although  in  this  con- 
nection it  be  granted  that  Princeton  was  the  freest  col- 
lege in  the  country  in  its  beginnings,  it  was  hardly  so 
in  its  development.  A  fatal  polemic  spirit  seized  hold 
of  it,  and  as  the  institution  passed  through  three  external 
stages,  corresponding  to  the  three  speculative  movements 
of  the  age,  it  grew  more  and  more  restricted  and  unre- 
eeptive. 

During  the  Revolutionary  War  Nassau  Hall  was  a 
refuge  for  the  military,  but  not  for  the  intellectuals; 
it  received  Washington  and  his  forces,  but  shut  out 
the  stray  followers  of  Locke,  Berkeley,  Hume,  Hartley, 
and  Darwin.  In  a  word,  the  college  which  had  been  a 
defense  of  the  faith  against  the  attacks  of  the  deists 
became  what  one  of  the  defenders  of  natural  realism 
has  called  a  bulwark  of  impregnable  truth  before  which 
all  forms  of  error  and  irreligion  must  give  way.  To 
explain  this  state  of  affairs  a  parallel  may  be  drawn. 
As  Princeton,  situated  on  the  highway  between  New 
York  and  Philadelphia,  was  a  critical  battleground  be- 
tween the  British  and  the  Americans,  so  it  became  a 
position  of  strategic  importance  between  the  idealists 
of  the  North  and  the  materialists  of  the  South.  But 
in  the  latter  case,  the  victory  over  the  opposing  forces 
was  gained  only  at  considerable  expense,  the  loss  of  a 
certain  spirit  of  liberality,  due  to  the  replacement  of 
speculation  by  dogma,  of  philosophy  by  theology.  Start- 
ing as  a  non-ecclesiastical  body,  formed  by  the  broader 


THE  PRINCETON  SCHOOL  125 

men  of  the  synod  of  New  York,  a  Presbyterian  form 
of  belief  came  in  with  Witherspoon,  increased  with 
Stanhope  Smith,  until  with  the  appearance  of  Ashbel 
Green  in  1812,  the  theological  seminar}^  so  dominated  the 
college,  that  the  two  were  persistently  identified  up 
to  the  very  sesquicentennial  of  the  University. 

All  this  may  serve  to  explain  the  Princetonian  claim 
that  it  was  the  Scottish- American  realism,  and  not  New 
England  transcendentalism,  that  was  to  be  considered, 
in  largest  measure,  the  peculiar  philosophy  of  the  coun- 
try. Nevertheless,  for  the  settling  of  these  alternatives, 
one  might  ask  which  of  the  two  systems  better  fulfilled 
the  criteria  of  native  origin,  of  progressiveness,  of  lib- 
erality of  spirit,  and  of  toleration  of  other  forms  of 
thought.  The  question  is  a  large  one  and  answerable  only 
after  one  has  gained  the  proper  historical  data,  data 
which  are  in  turn  furnished  only  by  a  consideration  of 
the  personal  representatives  of  natural  realism. 

In  its  early  days  Nassau  Hall  went  through  a  period  -4 
of  unthinking  placidity.  But  with  the  advent  of  Presi- 
dent Witherspoon  in  1768,  the  philosophical  situation 
became  as  agitated  as  was  the  political,  for  now  Eng- 
lish deism  vanished,  an  American  form  of  idealism  was 
driven  forth,  and  Scotch  realism  became  the  official  sys- 
tem of  the  place.  In  short,  the  era  of  deduction  and 
design  was  succeeded  by  the  era  of  induction  and  com- 
mon sense,  or  as  the  new  college  head  phrased  the  matter 
— it  is  safer  in  our  reasonings  to  trace  facts  upwards  than 
to  reason  downwards. 

The  accounts  of  the  personality  of  Witherspoon  vary. 
A  recent  biographer  describes  him  as  a  man  of  extraor- 
dinary force,  versatility,  and  charm ;  eminent  as  a 
teacher,  preacher,  politician,  law-maker,  and  philosopher, 
and  with  the  exception  of  Washington,  as  having  more 


126  REALISM 

of  the  quality  called  presence  than,  perhaps,  any  other 
man  of  his  time  in  America.  On  the  other  hand, 
Thomas  Carlyle  said  that  he  was  of  a  disagreeable 
temper;  Jonathan  Odell  satirized  him  as  "  fierce  as  the 
fiercest,  foremost  of  the  first  ' ' ;  John  Adams  declared 
him  clear  but  a  little  heavy  in  his  speech ;  and  President 
Stiles  of  Yale  shrewdly  remarked  that  while  the  doc- 
tor was  of  a  reasoning  make,  his  philosophical  learning 
was  not  great.  In  truth  Witherspoon  was  a  man  of 
action  rather  than  reflection.  As  a  further  hindrance  to 
free  speculation  he  had  entered  the  country  with  his 
mind  somewhat  rigidly  made  up,  and  at  the  age  of  five- 
and-forty  possessed  ideas  more  conservative  than  those  of 
his  predecessors.  The  former  heads  of  the  college, 
graduates  of  Harvard  and  Yale,  had  been  open  to  the 
influences  of  the  earlier  optimistic  deism;  they  had 
argued  in  favor  of  this  being  the  best  possible  world; 
they  had  looked  on  the  workings  of  nature  with  such 
admiring  eyes  as  to  be  well-nigh  ready  to  grant  it  self- 
sufficiency.  But  to  the  lineal  descendant  of  John  Knox 
the  external  world  bore  a  different  aspect;  in  itself  it 
was  far  from  being  perfect  or  self-sufficient;  rather  it 
was  a  created  thing,  a  limited  thing,  a  thing  full  of 
defects. 

Moreover,  for  those  who  have  great  charity  for  athe- 
ists and  deists,  Witherspoon  draws  up,  in  obvious  parody 
of  the  Anglicans,  what  he  denominates  his  Athenian 
Creed : 

I  believe  in  the  beauty  and  comely  proportions  of  Dame 
Nature,  and  in  almighty  Fate,  her  parent  and  guardian.  .  .  . 
I  believe  that  the  universe  is  a  huge  machine,  wound  up  from 
everlasting  by  necessity,  and  consisting  of  an  infinite  number 
of  links  and  chains,  each  in  a  progressive  motion  towards  the 
zenith  of  perfection  and  meridian  of  glory;  that  I  myself  am 


THE  PRINCETON  SCHOOL  127 

a  little  glorious  piece  of  clockwork,  a  wheel  within  a  wheel, 
or  rather  a  pendulum  in  this  gi-and  machine  swinging  hither 
and  thither  by  the  different  impulses  of  fate  and  destiny;  that 
my  soul  (if  I  have  any)  is  an  imperceptible  bundle  of  exceed- 
ing minute  corpuscles,  much  smaller  than  the  smallest  Hol- 
land sand.  ...  I  believe  that  there  is  no  ill  in  the  universe, 
nor  any  such  thing  as  virtue,  absolutely  considered;  that  these 
things,  vulgarly  called  sins,  are  only  errors  in  judgment,  and 
foils  to  set  off  the  beauty  of  nature,  or  patches  to  adorn  her 
face. 

Harassed    by    the   host    of    enemies    raised    by    this 
anonymous  satire  of  his,  "Witherspoon  accepted  the  re- 
peated offer  of  the  presidency  of  the  New  Jersey  Col- 
lege, which  was  pressed  upon  him  by  Benjamin  Rush, 
then  a  student  of  medicine  at  Edinburgh,  and  journeyed 
to  America,  where  he  was  received  as  if  he  were  the  verj^ 
prince  after  whom  the  college  was  named.     But  his 
duties  at  Princeton  were  not  easy.    In  teaching  alone,  in 
addition  to  a  course  in  moral  philosophy,  he  included 
lectures  to  the  juniors  and  seniors  upon  chronology  and 
history,  composition  and  criticism,  Hebrew  and  French. 
Then,  too,  speculative  troubles  stared  him  in  the  face; 
on  his  arrival  he  found  that  the  Irish  idealism  had 
obtained  a  footing  in  the  locality.     According  to  the 
later  account  of  President  Ashbel  Green,  the  Berkeleian 
system  of  metaphysics  was  in  repute  in  the  college  when 
Witherspoon  entered.    The  tutors  were  zealous  believers 
in  it  and  waited  for  the  president  with  some  expectation 
of  either  confounding  him  or  making  him  a  proselyte. 
They  had  mistaken  their  man.    He  first  reasoned  against 
the  system,  and  then  ridiculed  it  till  he  drove  it  out  of 
the  college.    The  writer  has  heard  him  stato  that  before 
Reid  or  any  other  author  of  their  views  had  published 
any  theory  on  the  ideal  system,  he  wrote  against  it,  and 
suggested  the  same  trains  of  thought  which  they  adopted. 


128  REALISM 

and  that  he  published  his  essay  in  a  Scotch  magazine. 
This  essay  has  at  last  been  discovered,  yet  an  extract 
from  it  will  show  that  it  was  but  a  dubious  refutation 
of  Berkeleianisra,  According  to  "Witherspoon  we  never 
hear  of  a  deceitful  sound,  a  deceitful  smell,  or  a  de- 
ceitful taste;  but  only,  that  the  objects  we  see  are  not 
in  all  respects  the  same  as  we  may  imagine  them  upon 
the  first  inspection.  A  square  tower  at  a  distance  ap- 
pears to  be  round;  the  body  of  the  sun  seems  to  have 
but  two  feet  diameter;  objects  in  the  same  line,  though 
at  different  distances,  appear  to  be  contiguous ;  what  does 
this  imply,  more  than  that  an  accurate  discovery  of  the 
bulk,  figure,  and  distance  of  bodies,  cannot,  and  was 
never  intended  to  be  made  from  sight  alone  ?  It  is  very 
probable,  from  the  manner  in  which  children  view  ob- 
jects at  first,  that  they  appear  to  them  all  in  a  plain,  or 
rather  that  the  image  makes  a  sensible  impression  on 
the  retina  of  the  eye,  that  it  is  by  experience  thej^  learn 
to  place  them  at  different  distances,  and  by  the  connec- 
tion of  ideas  that  they  have  an  immediate  perception  of 
the  distance  when  the  image  strikes  them.  Perhaps  it 
may  be  objected,  that  color,  which  is  allowed  to  be  the 
proper  object  of  sight,  and  of  sight  alone,  is  not  in  the 
object,  and  yet  is  supposed  in  it.  I  answer,  it  is  as 
much  in  the  object  as  other  secondary  qualities  are.  The 
object  hath  not  our  sensation,  but  a  power  to  produce  it ; 
and  there  is  a  real  difference  in  the  object  to  make  it  of 
a  different  color,  viz.,  a  peculiar  disposition  of  its  parts 
to  reflect  only  rays  of  such  or  such  a  kind.  Upon  the 
whole,  it  is  nothing  else,  but  the  very  excellence  of  the 
sense  of  sight,  or  its  great  serviceableness  to  us  in 
more  respects  than  its  immediate  office,  that  gives  oc- 
casion or  any  plausibility  to  its  being  charged  with 
delusion. 


THE  PRINCETON  SCHOOL  129 

AH  that  the  critic  offers  in  support  of  this  strange 
compound  opinion,  is  an  argument  from  analogj^  that 
there  are  delusive  or  deceitful  perceptions  conveyed  to 
us  by  our  senses  in  the  natural  world,  that  the  representa- 
tions of  objects  and  their  qualities  differ  from  what 
philosophy  discovers  them  to  be.  Of  this  he  gives  one 
particular  instance,  from  the  objects  of  sight,  that  a  sur- 
face appears  smooth  and  uniform,  whereas  it  is  rough 
and  uneven  when  examined  with  a  microscope.  He  then 
observes  in  general,  that  it  is  now  universally  admitted, 
that  the  qualities  called  secondary  which  we  by  natural 
instinct  attribute  to  matter,  belong  not  to  matter,  nor 
exist  really  without  us;  that  color  is  not  in  the  object, 
etc.  Now,  an  analogical  argument  cannot  be  more  ef- 
fectually destroyed  than  by  showing  the  falsehood  of  the 
fact  upon  which  it  is  founded.  "  I  affirm,  therefore," 
concludes  Witherspoon,  **  that  the  observation  he  makes, 
and  takes  for  granted,  is  not  just ;  but  that  the  ideas  we 
receive  by  our  senses,  and  the  persuasions  we  derive  im- 
mediately from  them,  are  exactly  according  to  truth,  to 
real  truth,  which  certainly  ought  to  be  the  same  with 
philosophic  truth." 

We  shall  return  to  Witherspoon 's  fight  against  the 
American  form  of  idealism.  Meanwhile  in  his  Lectures 
on  Moral  Philosophy  he  had  the  distinction  of  being  the 
first  college  head  in  the  country  to  set  forth  in  his  class- 
room a  definite  system  of  ethics.  This  system,  as  Lansing 
Collins,  the  editor  of  the  recent  reprint  of  the  Lectures, 
has  said,  was  the  realism  of  Thomas  Reid  and  the  Scot- 
tish common-sense  school,  a  philosophy  not  unkno^m  in 
Princeton  before  Witherspoon  came,  andfone  which  by 
the  labors  of  the  next  twenty-five  years  he  was  to  firmly 
intrench  in  the  congenial  soil  of  the  New  World.  To 
prove  the  Scotch  school  right  Witherspoon  would  prove 


130  REALISM 

that  the  other  schools  are  wrong.  He  explains  that  in 
opposition  to  such  infidel  writers  as  David  Hume,  who 
sought  to  shake  the  certainty  of  our  belief  upon  cause 
and  effect,  upon  personal  identity,  and  the  idea  of 
power,  some  writers  have  advanced,  with  great  apparent 
reason,  that  there  are  certain  first  principles  or  dictates 
of  common  sense,  which  are  either  first  principles,  or 
principles  seen  with  intuitive  evidence.  These  are  the 
foundations  of  all  reasoning,  and  without  them  to  reason 
is  a  word  without  a  meaning.  They  can  no  more  be 
proved  than  you  can  prove  an  axiom  in  mathematical 
science.  These  authors  of  Scotland  have  lately  pro- 
duced and  supported  this  opinion,  to  resolve  at  once  all 
the  refinements  and  metaphysical  objections  of  some  in- 
fidel writers. 

Witherspoon's  method  of  attack  sheds  light  on  the 
most  interesting  philosophical  event  of  his  administra- 
tion at  the  College  of  New  Jersey.  That  event  was  his 
successful  attack  on  idealism.  A  single  tutor,  Joseph 
Periam,  had  been  the  unhappy  vehicle  for  the  Berkeleian 
metaphysics,  and  Stanhope  Smith,  the  president's  own 
son-in-law  and  successor  in  office,  had  become  infected 
with  the  taint  of  what  was  described  as  that  impious 
skepticism  which  wholly  denies  the  existence  of  matter. 
According  to  one  version,  Periam,  soon  after  his  gradua- 
tion in  1762,  embraced  the  bishop's  theory  denying  the 
existence  of  the  material  universe,  and  Smith,  who  was 
intimate  with  him,  was  thereby  in  great  danger  of  mak- 
ing shipwreck  of  his  religious  principles.  Of  the  precise 
manner  in  which  immaterialism  was  introduced  into 
Nassau  Hall  we  have  no  record.  It  is  very  unlikely  that 
Samuel  Johnson's  Berkeleian  Elements  of  Philosophy 
was  used  there,  as  it  was  in  the  Philadelphia  Academy, 
for  Johnson,  as  head  of  the  Episcopalian  King's  College 


THE  PRINCETON  SCHOOL  131 

in  New  York,  had  called  the  rival  Presbyterian  College 
of  New  Jersey  a  fountain  of  nonsense. 

Nor  did  the  other  colonial  idealist  leave  behind  him 
any  trace  of  his  peculiar  mystical  theory  of  knowledge. 
Jonathan  Edwards  lived  too  short  a  time  as  president 
of  Princeton  to  affect  the  college  directly.  So  we  are 
forced  to  seek  a  roundabout  way  by  which  idealism  may 
have  filtered  in.  There  is  record  of  one  Ebenezcr  Brad- 
ford, a  Connecticut  student  and  a  subsequent  advocate  of 
the  Northern  immaterialism,  who  wrote  to  Dr.  Bellamy, 
one  of  the  later  Edwardeans,  the  following  ingenuous 
tale:  "  Dr.  Witherspoon  was  a  great  enemy  to  what  they 
call  the  Eastward  or  New  Divinity,  which  was  so  much 
exploded  by  all  in  college  that  when  I  came  here  I 
was  advised  by  a  particular  friend  not  to  let  my  senti- 
ments be  known  by  any  means,  alleging  it  would  be  of 
great  disservice  to  me.  I  found  two  or  three,  however, 
who  dared  to  think  for  themselves,  and  we  agreed  to 
promote  what  we  judged  to  be  truth  in  as  private  and 
hidden  manner  as  possible.  We  ventured  to  read  some 
of  your  books  with  the  title  pages  cut  out,  which  were 
much  admired  by  those  who  professed  themselves  ene- 
mies to  the  New  Divinity." 

By  whatever  devious  path  idealism  worked  its  way  into 
Princeton,  it  is  tolerably  clear,  from  this  naive  account, 
that  Witherspoon  was  a  high  conservative,  preferring 
above  all  things  what  the  narrator  terms  ' '  notions  which 
appear  greatly  confined."  The  result  of  this  bias  was 
practically  seen  in  the  career  of  Periam,  who,  from 
being  a  "  very  ingenious  young  man,"  became  "  a  verj' 
serious  man."  But  before  this  change  of  mind  had 
occurred,  Princeton's  earliest  idealist  had  influenced  a 
person  of  much  greater  importance  than  himself. 

Samuel  Stanhope  Smith,  the  son  of  an  Irisli  Presby- 


132  REALISM 

terian  divine,  and  in  turn  student,  tutor,  professor  of 
moral  philosophy,  and  president,  coming  to  the  college 
at  the  age  of  sixteen,  before  President-Elect  Wither- 
spoon  had  arrived  from  Scotland,  was  consigned  more 
especially  to  the  care  of  tutor  Periam.  Now,  Periam, 
continues  Smith's  biographer,  had  not  confined  himself 
to  the  study  of  mathematics,  but  had  extended  his  in- 
quiries to  metaphysics  also,  and  become  infected  with 
the  fanciful  doctrine  of  Bishop  Berkeley,  which  con- 
sists, as  is  generally  known,  in  denying  the  existence  of 
a  material  universe,  and  converting  every  object  of  the 
senses  into  a  train  of  fugitive  perceptions.  How  this 
professor,  who  had  been  habituated  to  the  hardy  pur- 
suits of  mathematical  science  and  the  inductive  philos- 
ophy, could  ever  have  brought  himself  to  embrace  such 
a  visionary  theory,  a  theory  so  repugnant  to  common 
sense,  and  rather  an  object  of  ridicule  than  of  serious 
consideration,  it  is  difficult  to  explain,  unless  it  be  upon 
the  principle  that,  having  been  accustomed  to  require 
the  most  conclusive  proof  of  everything  before  he  as- 
sented to  its  truth,  he  so  far  misconceived  the  subject  as 
to  imagine  that  he  must  have  arguments  drawn  from 
reason,  to  convince  him  of  the  existence  of  an  exterior 
world,  before  he  would  admit  the  reality  of  it ;  and  this 
surely  is  an  evidence  which  Nature  would  deny  him, 
as  she  rests  the  proof  of  it  solely  and  entirely  upon 
the  simple  testimony  of  the  senses.  However  this  may 
have  been,  Periam  had  address  and  ingenuity  enough  to 
infuse  the  principles  of  the  Bishop  of  Cloyne  into  the 
mind  of  Smith,  and  he  began  seriously  to  doubt  whether 
there  were  in  the  world  such  real  existences  as  the  sun, 
moon,  and  stars;  rivers,  mountains,  and  human  beings. 
In  this  ponderous  account  we  catch  the  unsympathetic 
tone  of  realism  toward  idealism.    To  convert  the  pervert 


THE  PRINCETON  SCHOOL  133 

back  to  the  true  faith  the  method  of  vilifiention  is  now 
used.  The  account  runs  how,  upon  the  arrival  of  Dr. 
Witherspoon,  the  poor  undergraduate,  captivated  by  the 
specious  fallacies  of  the  Bishop  of  Cloyne,  held  in 
bondage  by  the  silken  chains  of  a  fantastic  theory,  was 
conducted  out  of  the  dark  labyrinth  into  which  he  had 
been  betrayed,  and  from  the  cloudy  speculations  of  im- 
materialism  brought  back  to  the  clear  light  of  common 
sense. 

Stanhope  Smith  being  the  first  graduate  of  the  college 
to  become  its  head,  Princeton  was  now  subject  to  a  sort 
of  intellectual  inbreeding.  By  this  the  strain  of  realism 
tended  to  become  fixed.  This  is  discovered  in  the  writ- 
ings of  the  next  representative  of  the  Princeton  school. 
In  his  Betrospect  of  the  Eighteenth  Century,  Samuel 
Miller  informs  his  readers  that  the  writers  of  the 
common-sense  school  have  contributed  the  most  impor- 
tant accessions  which  the  philosophy  of  mind  has  re- 
ceived since  the  time  of  Locke.  Their  first  sen'icc  w^as 
to  cease  the  senseless  prattling  about  occult  terms;  their 
next  in  observing  the  skeptical  conclusions  which  Berke- 
ley had  dra^^Tl  from  the  old  theory  of  perception  when 
he  contended  that  all  the  varied  beauties  of  creation 
which  we  behold  are  nothing  more  than  fancy  or 
images  impressed  on  the  mind. 

Here  is  a  triple  misinterpretation.  It  was  not  the 
realists  but  the  immaterialists  who  earliest  attacked  oc- 
cult terms  such  as  material  "  substance."  Again, 
Berkeley  did  not  use  the  old  theory  of  perception,  but 
put  in  its  place  a  new  theory  of  vision.  Finally,  the 
good  bishop  did  not  draw  skeptical  conclusions  in  mak- 
ing what  are  usually  called  material  objects  "  mere 
fancies,  and  not  in  accordance  with  the  lawful  language 
of  signs  ";  rather  did  he  tcar-h  a  spiritual  realism,  in 


134  REALISM 

which  the  objects  of  sense  are  so  many  alluring  words 
of  a  divine  visual  language. 

Miller's  Retrospect  was  called  in  irony  the  funeral 
discourse  of  the  eighteenth  century.  From  this  it  might 
easily  be  inferred  what  system  he  would  next  consign 
to  the  philosophic  potter's  field.  It  was  materialism. 
Its  principles  he  supposes  many  superficial  thinkers 
have  been  seduced  into  adopting  by  the  plausible  aspect 
which  it  wears.  Its  object  is  to  reduce  all  the  energies 
of  intellectual  and  animal  life  to  the  operation  of  an  in- 
visible fluid  secreted  by  the  brain,  and  existing  in  eveiy 
part  of  the  body.  But  does  this  fluid  exist?  If  so,  it 
explains  nothing;  the  whole  business  of  causation  is  as 
much  in  the  dark  as  ever,  even  after  all  the  parade  of 
development  through  contractions,  fibrous  motions,  and 
appetencies.  Indeed,  the  sensorial  power,  as  applied  to 
explain  the  phenomena  of  mind,  too  much  resembles  the 
occult  qualities,  the  phantasms,  and  the  essential  forms 
of  the  schoolmen ;  for  when  using  the  word  idea  some- 
times to  signify  the  fibrous  motion  and  sometimes  the 
sensorial,  it  signifies  both  the  cause  and  the  effect. 

This  is  unjust.  Most  of  the  materialists  in  the  land 
did  not  pretend  to  explain  the  nature  of  causation,  but 
only  to  describe  things  caused.  All  they  claimed  was  that 
nervous  contractions  and  fibrous  motions  were  not  the 
efficients  but  merely  the  occasions  of  the  accompanying 
mental  phenomena.  They  only  stated  that  the  physical 
and  the  psychical  occurred  side  by  side  and  thus  an- 
ticipated, in  large  measure,  the  modern  doctrine  of 
parallelism.  But  Miller  cannot  see  the  new  trail  which 
was  destined  to  open  the  way  for  the  future  experimental 
psychology.  Instead  he  concludes  his  work  with  the 
pessimistic  remark  that  if  the  physical  sciences  have 
received  great  improvement  during  the  century  under 


THE  LESSER  REALISTS  135 

consideration,  it  is  feared  that  the  same  cannot  with 
truth  be  said  respecting  the  science  of  the  human  mind ; 
in  this  wide  field,  new  experiences  and  discoveries,  in 
the  proper  sense  of  the  word,  can  have  no  place.  By 
such  a  denial  the  Princeton  historian  went  far  to  im- 
pair the  claim  that  realism  was  to  be  the  coming  philos- 
ophy of  America,  for  such  a  denial  ran  counter  to  the 
inventive  genius  of  his  countrymen,  cast  reflections  on 
such  psychological  experiments  as  were  framed  by  Rush, 
and  perhaps  thereby  prevented  the  rise  of  a  school  of 
experimentalists  among  such  Princetonians,  for  example, 
as  the  electrician  Joseph  Henrj\  But  fancies  aside,  the 
facts  are  that  the  spirit  of  common  sense  left  little  to 
the  imagination,  desired  no  novel  inventions,  but  pre- 
ferred to  keep  its  adherents  revolving  in  the  treadmill 
of  traditional  thought.  In  fine,  the  policy  of  the  New- 
Jersey  College  was  to  turn  out  safe  minds  content  to 
mark  time  in  the  old  way. 

3.    The  Lesser  Realists 

With  the  lesser  realists  we  foresee  the  breaking  up 
of  the  old  system.  Thus  Frederick  Beasley  recalled 
how  in  the  College  of  Princeton  the  fanciful  theory  of 
Bishop  Berkeley,  as  a  kind  of  philosophical  day-dream, 
was  superseded  by  the  Scottish  school,  but  that  these 
men  had  done  their  predecessors  very  great  injustice. 
Against  these  misinterpreters  Beasley  now  proceeds 
to  raise  against  his  adversaries  what  he  calls  the  literary 
tomahawk.  He  does  this  with  such  cruel  effect  as  to 
lay  bare  the  skulls  of  his  enemies  and  to  discover  to 
the  world  brain  capacities  not  so  large  as  had  been  pre- 
sumed. The  propensity  of  the  Scots,  he  exclaims,  is  to 
cavil  at  the  doctrines  of  preceding  philosophers,  espe- 


136  REALISM 

cially  Berkeley's  new  theory  of  vision  and  his  theory 
of  the  visual  language.  Yet  these  two  theories  may  be 
upheld  by  two  concrete  cases.  There  is  the  case  of  a 
woman  in  Pennsylvania  who,  having  cataracts  removed 
from  both  her  eyes,  declared  that  her  sensations  were 
indescribably  delightful,  but,  at  the  same  time,  her  newly 
recovered  power  of  vision  was  for  some  time  of  very 
little  use  to  her;  she  was  perpetually  stretching  out  her 
hands  for  fear  of  running  against  objects,  being  unable 
to  distinguish  their  distances  or  magnitudes.  Again  he 
illustrates  the  justness  of  the  observation,  that  in  all 
our  acquired  perceptions  we  proceed  according  to  the 
intei'pretation  of  signs,  and  whenever  the  sign  of  any- 
thing is  presented,  the  mind  naturally  concludes  that 
the  thing  signified  is  present.  A  gentleman  passing 
along  the  streets  of  Philadelphia  imagines  that  he  per- 
ceives a  steamboat  in  the  Delaware  at  a  distance,  but 
upon  approaching  it,  finds  that  he  was  deceived,  for 
that  the  object  he  saw  was  a  sign-post  before  an  inn, 
upon  which  the  representation  of  a  steamboat  was  rudely 
painted. 

We  have  here  the  subjective  principle  of  interpre- 
tation brought  against  the  Scottish  common  sense  with 
its  absolute  and  universal  principles.  Another  instance 
of  a  similar  sort  is  found  in  the  doctrine  of  relativity, 
of  a  personal  as  against  a  public  standard,  as  pro- 
pounded by  another  of  the  lesser  realists,  Charles  Nis- 
bet.  He  explains  that  the  old  saying  of  Heracleitus — 
that  a  man  cannot  go  into  the  same  river  twice — applies 
to  the  mental  life.  Every  person  may  be  said  to  have  a 
certain  relative  measure  of  that  which  is  peculiar  to  him- 
self and  suited  to  his  own  feelings,  so  that  a  lecture  in 
philosophy  may  seem  as  long  as  a  game  of  cards,  though 
the  latter  be  actually  three  times  longer.    Nevertheless, 


THE  LESSER  REALISTS  137 

when  we  arc  attentive  to  our  own  thoughts  we  discover 
a  sort  of  pomp  or  procession  of  ideas  which  succeed  one 
another  in  our  minds  with  a  regular  pace  or  march,  and 
this  regularity  could  not  exist  unless  we  had  a  common 
measure  without  ourselves,  a  means  whereby  mankind 
can  agree  with  each  other  with  respect  to  the  length  of 
determinate  things. 

"We  could  multiply  instances  of  the  lesser  lights  who 
discovered  breaks  in  the  system  of  common  sense,  but 
such  men  were  not  wanted  and  remained  ignored.  So 
it  is  that  in  reviewing  the  triumphant  course  of  natural 
realism  we  get  the  illusion  of  unbroken  ranks  of  be- 
lievers, from  the  early  Princeton  leaders  to  the  later 
Northern  representatives.  Throughout  there  was  ap- 
parent agreement,  from  the  official  heads  in  the  colleges 
to  the  popular  exponents  who  held  that  Reid  had  said 
the  last  safe  word  in  philosophy  and  that  Kant  opened 
up  the  abysses  of  skepticism. 

With  the  rise  of  New  England  transcendentalism  there 
came  a  life  and  death  struggle  between  the  old  and  the 
new.  We  have  previously  raised  the  question  which 
system  was  destined  to  be  the  American  philosophy.  We 
can  now  suggest  an  answer.  Which  of  the  two  fonns  of 
thought  best  fulfilled  the  requisite  of  native  origin,  of 
progressiveness,  of  liberality  of  spirit,  and  of  toleration 
of  other  forms  of  thought?  In  regard  to  natural  real- 
ism, it  may  be  said  that  as  it  was  foreign  in  its  origin,  so 
it  remained  an  exotic  in  its  characteristics,  lacking  those 
qualities  on  which  the  men  of  the  N'ew  World  prided 
themselves.  First,  it  was  unprogressive,  being  rightly 
accused  of  failure  to  advance;  thus  the  two  principal 
definitions  of  the  movement,  although  seventy  years 
apart,  were  in  substance  essentially  the  same.  Again,  it 
was  illiberal  towards  unrestrained  inquiry;  being  op- 


138  REALISM 

posed  to  the  speculative  ferment  of  Hume  and  the  free 
critical  methods  of  Kant,  it  was  rationalistic,  but  only 
within  the  limits  fixed  by  respectability.  Lastly,  it  was 
intolerant  of  other  systems;  as  it  fought  the  European 
forms  of  deism,  idealism,  and  naturalism  of  the  eight- 
eenth century,  so  it  came  to  look  askance  upon  the  French 
positivism,  the  German  idealism,  and  the  British  evolu- 
tionary doctrines  of  the  nineteenth.  These  are  the 
shortcomings  of  realism,  but,  inasmuch  as  its  aim  was  to 
be  a  safe  and  sound  philosophy,  they  are  to  be  con- 
sidered not  as  fundamental  deficiencies  but  only  as  the 
defects  of  its  qualities.  In  marked  contrast,  however, 
to  the  Scottish  realism  was  the  New  England  tran- 
scendentalism, whose  characteristics  were  the  direct  op- 
posite of  its  chief  rival.  Instead  of  being  a  foreign 
importation  brought  over  in  the  original  form,  it  was 
essentially  a  native  growth  deeply  rooted  in  its  age  and 
surroundings.  Historic  forces  were  visible  in  it,  but 
these  had  been  so  assimilated  that  they  appeared  not  so 
much  initial  impulses  as  remote  resultants.  Hence 
transcendentalism  possessed  the  typical  marks  of  the 
receptive  American  mind.  First  it  was  progressive; 
starting  with  the  Platonism  latent  in  Puritanism,  it 
drew  nourishment  in  turn  from  the  Berkeleian,  Kantian. 
and  Hegelian  idealism.  Again  it  was  liberal;  instead 
of  opposing  the  spirit  of  free  inquiry,  it  exliibited  a 
generous  interest  in  regard  to  other  systems,  translat- 
ing not  merely  the  philosophical  classics  of  France  and 
Germany  but,  as  in  the  case  of  Emerson,  seeking  in- 
spiration from  the  sacred  books  of  the  East.  This 
lenient  attitude  towards  an  unrestricted  immigration  of 
foreign  thought  brought  about  the  last  and  most  obvious 
characteristic  of  transcendentalism,  its  utter  tolerance 
of  other  systems.    Thus  it  took  from  the  Puritans  their 


THE  LESSER  REALISTS  139 

individualism,  from  the  deists  their  arguments  for 
design,  from  the  idealists  their  phenomenalism,  from  the 
materialists  their  dynamic  conception  of  the  universe, 
from  the  realists  themselves  their  doctrine  of  immediate 
intuition.  This  may  be  considered  such  an  extreme 
eclecticism  as  not  to  deserve  the  name  of  a  system  ;  it  may 
nevertheless  be  said  in  conclusion  that  whether  or  not 
transcendentalism  was  the  coming  philosophy  of  Amer- 
ica, it  at  least  furnished  a  native  epitome  of  American 
philosophy  as  it  was  developed  in  its  early  schools. 


CHAPTER  VI 
TRANSCENDENTALISM 

1,   Emerson,  Interpeeter  of  Nature 

There  is  an  inscription  on  an  old  wall  of  Revolution- 
ary' days,  that,  ruined  by  the  war,  it  was  rebuilt  more 
strongly  out  of  the  old  materials.  This,  in  a  figure,  ex- 
plains the  beginnings  of  transcendentalism  in  America. 
After  the  dark  and  sterile  period  in  our  philosophy,  the 
movement  in  New  England  suddenly  gathered  up  the 
forces  of  the  previous  times.  Transcendentalism  summed 
up  in  itself  the  marks  of  all  three  centuries, — the  faith 
I  of  the  seventeenth,  the  reason  of  the  eighteenth,  the 
i  feeling  of  the  nineteenth.  As  we  may  recall,  the  age  of 
unreason,  or  dependency  on  inscrutable  decrees,  had  been 
succeeded  by  that  of  reason,  or  the  power  of  man  fully 
to  understand  nature,  and  that  in  turn  by  the  age  of 
sentiment, — the  outpouring  of  the  romantic  spirit.  It 
remained  for  one  man  to  fuse  these  three  factors  into  a 
system.  Emerson  believed  in  faith  in  self,  or  self- 
reliance;  he  believed  in  reason  in  nature,  for  nature 
was  the  present  expositor  of  the  divine  mind;  he  be- 
lieved in  feeling  toward  his  fellow-men,  for  he  looked 
on  man  as  a  fagade  of  a  temple,  "  wherein  all  wisdom 
and  all  good  abide." 

This  fusion  of  the  spirit  of  three  centuries  brought 
a  new  note  into  philosophy.  No  longer  was  man  alone 
worshiped  as  admirable;  no  longer  was  nature  consid- 
ered as  self-sufficient,  but  the  two  were  counted  com- 

140 


EMERSON,  INTERPRETER  OF  NATURE        1-41 

plcmentary.  Therefore  transcendentalism  may  be  looked 
at  from  a  double  aspect ;  practically,  as  an  assertion  of 
the  inalienable  worth  of  man ;  theoretically,  as  an  asser- 
tion of  the  immanence  of  the  divinity,  not  only  in  nature, 
but  in  human  nature:  "  There  is  one  mind,  and  all  the 
powers  and  privileges  which  lie  in  any  lie  in  all." 

Whence  arose  this  more  ardent  interpretation?  How 
were  the  old  ideas  transfused  by  emotion?  How  was 
it  that  the  worship  of  nature  and  of  human  nature 
were  thus  intimately  conjoined  ?  The  answer  may  be  put 
in  a  word.  These  changes  are  due  to  a  reaction,  a  re- 
vulsion against  intellect  as  the  sole  source  of  truth. 
Sensibility  and  will  now  demanded  their  share.  Men 
wanted  to  be  warmed,  to  be  inspired  to  do  something. 
For  these  positive  needs  there  had  been  a  long  negative 
preparation.  That  the  Northern  transcendentalism  was 
such  a  close  union  of  thought  and  feeling  was  due  to 
the  fact  that  for  two  centuries  New  England  had  been 
emotionally  starved.  The  echoes  of  the  Elizabethan  age 
had  long  since  died  away.  The  fervor  and  color  of  a 
richer  civilization  had  disappeared.  In  philosophy,  no 
system  between  1600  and  1800  had  offered  a  satisfac- 
tory blending.  There  were  three  alternatives,  no  one 
of  which  was  adequate:  Calvinism  had  degenerated 
into  superstition ;  deism,  with  the  cold,  drj'  light  of 
reason,  had  killed  enthusiasm;  realism  had  brought  all 
down  to  the  common  level  of  common  sense. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  new  conturs-,  then,  there  was 
a  felt  need  for  a  larger  life;  the  most  thoughtful  had 
been  so  long  frozen  in  their  feelings  that  they  waited 
eagerly  for  warmer  currents  of  thought.  Tho  younger 
generation  in  college  liad  to  find  emotional  stimulus  out- 
side of  the  curriculum.  The  change  that  came  about 
was,  briefly,  a  return  to  nature.    The  rationalism  of  that 


142  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

I  day  was  like  a  formal  English  garden  with  its  straight 
walks  and  clipped  hedges.  Transcendentalism  was 
like  the  American  fields  and  forests  with  their  broad 

lacres  and  their  tangled  wildernesses.  A  new  race  of 
thinkers  thus  arises.  The  closet  philosopher  is  suc- 
ceeded by  the  transcendental  traveler,  ever  in  the  air 
and  face  to  face  with  the  sun.  He  is  willing  to  wander 
far  in  search  of  spiritual  nourishment;  he  seeks  for 
the  fruits  of  nature  by  his  own  efforts  and  thereby  en- 
genders an  appetite  for  those  fruits.  Thus  comes  the 
keenness  of  the  younger  spirits  in  the  new  movement. 
They  are  eager  to  transcend  the  trammels  of  society,  to 
go  apart  by  themselves,  to  live  in  the  woods,  in  order  to 
penetrate  the  secrets  of  nature,  to  learn  the  mind  of 
outdoors. 

Having  considered  the  negative  preparation  of  previ- 
ous movements  and  the  positive  incitements  of  the  coun- 
try that  lay  about  them,  we  may  take  up  the  funda- 
mental beliefs  of  New  England  transcendentalists.  The 
first  of  their  beliefs  was  monism,  which  meant  not  only 
the  unity  of  the  world  in  God,  but  the  immanence  of 
God  in  the  world.  On  the  one  hand,  nature  is  the  ex- 
positor of  the  divine  mind ;  on  the  other,  man  is  the  soul 
of  the  whole,  of  the  Eternal  One.  A  second  belief  is 
that  of  the  microcosm, — because  of  the  indwelling  of 
divinity,  every  part  of  the  world,  however  small,  is  held 
to  contain  within  itself  all  the  laws  and  meaning  of  the 
universe: — Man  is  conscious  of  a  universal  soul  within 
his  individual  life,  he  is  an  analogist  and  studies  rela- 
tions in  all  objects ;  placed  in  the  center  of  beings,  a  ray 
of  relation  passes  from  every  other  being  to  him.  A  third 
belief  is  that  of  the  macrocosm,  which  holds  that  the  soul 
of  each  individual  is  identical  with  the  soul  of  the  world 
and  contains  latently  all  which  it  contains: — Man  is  a 


EMERSON,  INTERPRETER  OF  NATURE         143 

universal  mirror;  every  rational  creature  is  entitled  to 
partake  of  the  soul  of  the  world  by  his  constitution.  A  • 
final  belief  is  that  of  symbolism.  The  transcendentalist 
holds  that  nature  is  the  embodiment  of  spirit  in  the 
world  of  sense;  nature  is  a  great  picture  to  be  appre- 
ciated, a  great  book  to  be  read.  As  Emerson  expresses 
it,  there  is  radical  correspondence  between  visible  things  / 
and  human  thoughts.  .  ,  .  What  was  it  that  nature 
would  say?  Was  there  no  meaning  in  the  live  repose 
of  the  valley  behind  the  mill?  The  leafless  trees  and 
every  withered  stem  and  stubble,  rimed  with  frost,  con- 
tributed something  to  the  mute  music.  .  .  .  This  is  the 
symbolism  through  which  the  poetic  pantheist  finds  a 
higher  use  in  the  study  of  nature.  Nature,  he  ever  in- 
sists, is  the  incarnation,  not  only  of  the  true  and  beauti- 
ful, but  of  the  good.  Through  it,  the  individual  comes 
in  contact  with  the  very  spirit  and  being  of  God.  .  .  . 
Taking  the  old  figure,  that  the  visible  world  and  the 
relation  of  its  parts  is  the  dial  plate  of  the  invisible,  he 
adds  that  the  universe  becomes  transparent  and  the  light 
of  higher  laws  than  its  own  shines  through  it. 

It  is  in  his  love  of  nature  and  in  his  ability  to  read 
the  meaning  of  its  symbols  that  Emerson  showed  him- 
self a  native  representative  of  the  romantic  jnovement.  ^ 
Fond  of  the  fields  and  a  wanderer  in  the  woods,  he  had 
known  nature  in  all  its  moods,  and  had  h^arned  the  feel- 
ing of  kinship  between  man  and  the  world  in  which  he 
lives.  Indeed  his  first  w^ritten  confession  was  that  in 
the  wilderness  there  is  something  dear  and  connate. 
Words  such  as  these  furnish  the  prime  bond  of  connec- 
tion between  native  thought  and  that  of  Europe.  In 
holding  that  nature  and  human  nature  are  akin,  Emer- 
son is  in  harmony  with  the  English  romantic  movement 
of  his  day.     In  reading  Wordsworth  he  declares  that 


144  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

The  Excursion  awakens  in  every  lover  of  nature  the  right 
feeling.  We  saw  stars  shine,  we  felt  the  awe  of  moun- 
tains, we  heard  the  rustle  of  wind  in  the  grass,  and 
knew  again  the  ineffable  secret  of  solitude.  .  .  .  Does 
a  declaration  of  this  sort  mean  that  the  American  was 
unoriginal?  Such  a  conclusion  can  hardly  be  drawn 
from  the  passage,  for  Emerson  speaks  as  one  who  al- 
ready had  experienced  the  feelings  of  a  lover  of  nature, 
already  known  its  ineffable  secret.  We  may,  therefore, 
hold  that  the  early  New  England  transcendentalists 
I  were  of  like  spirit  with  Wordsworth  and  Coleridge,  but 
I  did  not  use  them  so  much  for  authorities,  as  for  corrobo- 
rators  of  their  kindred  beliefs.  They  did  not  borrow, 
they  sympathized,  and  that  because  they  had  already 
been  under  common  influences. 

Of  these  influences  the  earliest  had  been  the^J]renph. 
In  America  as  inTlngland  the  turmoil  of  the  great 
revolution  had  stirred  men's  minds,  for  the  mental  un- 
rest which  followed  was  an  outgrowth  of  the  old  liberty 
of  philosophizing.  Upon  the  ancient  stock  of  English 
independency  there  was  grafted  the  vigorous  branch 
of  French  liberty.  In  New  England  there  had  been 
an  unbroken  expression  of  the  rights  of  individual  judg- 
ment. Those  Independents  who  came  from  the  eastern 
counties  of  England,  once  settled  by  the  roving  Danes, 
,  held  that  every  man  had  a  full  right  to  his  own  beliefs. 
""But  more  fervent  expressions  of  these  beliefs  and  their 
junction  with  the  emotions  of  the  heart  now  took  a 
French  form.  The  spirit  of  liberty  was  English,  but 
warmth  and  ardor  were  brought  to  the  cool  Anglo- 
American  by  his  Gallic  brothers.  The  rights  of  man 
were  no  longer  to  be  expressed  merely  in  public  docu- 
ments, in  measured  terms,  but  each  man  was  to  follow 
his  own  private  inclinations,  to  break  do\vn  the  trammels 


EMEKSUN,  INTERPRETER  OF  NATURE        145 

of  society,  to  rely  upon  himself.  Seldom  before  had  i^-_ 
djvidu.alism  reached  such  heights.  Indeed  by  a  sort  of 
paradox  it  led  to  a  degree  of  detachment  that  was  at 
times  indifference.  The  transeendentalist  had  so  freed 
himself  from  tradition  that  he  at  once  broke  from  sec- 
tarianism. 

In  the  case  of  Emerson,  the  break  came  first  in  re- 
ligion. As  an  individualist,  he  felt  a  lack  of  interest 
in  the  dogma  of  his  denomination.  He  publicly  ex- 
pressed his  opinion,  that  the  Christian  scheme  no  longer 
interested  him.  In  the  words  of  an  English  critic,  he 
left  his  church  with  a  yawn. 

The  refusal  to  be  tied  by  tradition  may  also  be  laid 
to  the  influence  of  developed  deism.  Non-sectarianism 
was  an  heritage  of  the  old  belief  that  all  religions  are 
but  parts  of  one  great  religion,  the  religion  of  nature. 
It  made  no  difference  to  the  transeendentalist  whence 
he  drew  his  inspiration,  provided  there  was  inspiration. 
A  marked  aspect  of  our  day,  observed  Bronson  Alcott, 
is  its  recovery  and  recognition  of  past  times  and  great 
names.  The  same  thought  was  expressed  by  Emerson, 
in  an  early  number  of  the  Dial,  when  he  asserted: 
We  have  every  day  occasion  to  remark  transcendental- 
ism's perfect  identity,  under  whatever  new  phraseology 
or  application  to  new  facts,  with  the  liberal  thought  of 
all  men  of  a  religious  and  contemplative  habit  in  other 
times  and  countries. 

The  transeendentalist  as  a  cosmopolite  is  a  strange 
figure.  He  has  been  commonly  represented  as  priding 
himself  on  being  a  point  around  which  all  thought  re- 
volves, and  has  led  the  scornful  to  infer  from  this,  that 
he  was  a  vanishing  point.  But  his  conceit  was  really 
not  based  upon  mere  egotism,  but  upon  a  broad  knowl- 
edge and  a  remarkable  range  of  reading.    It  is  seldom 


146  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

remembered  that  by  the  time  Emerson  published  his 
first  volume,  Nature,  in  1836,  he  had  traveled  in  Eu- 
rope; had  known  many  cities  and  many  men,  and  had 
read  widely  of  other  days  and  other  climes.  He  had 
been  considered  an  eclectic  philosopher ;  he  should  rather 
be  called  an  ethnic  philosopher.  He  casually  puts  Jesus 
and  Socrates  on  the  same  level  and  then  goes  on  to  quote 
Coleridge  and  Spinoza,  Plato  and  Plotinus,  Zoroaster 
and  the  Hindoos,  and  ends  with  the  quiet  assertion: 
"  All  goes  back  to  the  East." 

There  are  already  sufficient  factors  noted  to  account 
for  the  philosophy  of  Emerson,  not  only  in  its  matter, 
but  in  its  form.  The  matter  was  got  from  his  inner  ex- 
perience and  from  his  own  countryside,  that  fair  appari- 
tion that  shone  so  peacefully  about  him.  The  form  was 
gained  from  much  reading  in  the  old  English  poets,  the 
Cambridge  philosophers,  and  the  ancient  classical 
writers. 

We  are  now  in  a  position  to  explain  three  principles  at 
|the  bottom  of  Emerson's  philosophy.  They  are  imma- 
nence in  respect  to  nature;  benevolence  in  respect  to 
God ;  self-reliance  in  respect  to  man.  Immanence  implies 
the  unity  of  the  intelligent  principle  in  the  world,  in  the 
creation  itself.  Here  man  calls  the  universal  soul,  rea- 
son ;  it  is  not  mine  or  thine,  or  his,  but  we  are  its.  And 
the  blue  sky  in  which  the  private  earth  is  buried,  the 
sky  with  its  eternal  calm,  is  the  type  of  reason.  .  .  . 
Again,  immanence  implies  that  all  that  exists,  exists  in 
God,  and  that  there  is  no  difference  in  substance  between 
the  universe  and  God.  Man  as  a  part  of  nature  is  akin 
to  the  divine  spirit.  .  .  .  When  I  behold  the  sunrise 
...  I  seem  to  partake  of  its  rapid  transformations.  .  .  . 
Thus  does  nature  deify  us. 

In  these  broken  words  Emerson  hints  at  that  funda- 


i-  X. 


EMERSON,  INTERPRETER  OF  NATURE        147 

mental  coalescence  between  the  circles  of  his  system. 
Man  partakes  of  nature,  nature  partakes  of  deity,  and,  l 
through  the  enshrouding  universal  spirit,  each  partakes  | 
of  all.  These  beliefs  came  as  a  revulsion  from  the  old 
Calvinistic  transcendence.  The  doctrine  of  a  deity 
separate  from  his  world,  absolute,  arbitrary,  inscrutable 
in  his  ways,  is  now  supplanted  by  the  doctrine  of  the 
deification  of  the  world,  and  the  rendering  of  it:  rea- 
sonable by  the  indwellihg  of  an  intelligent  principle. 
There  is  also  a  revulsion  from  another  sort  of  transcend-  i 
ence,  that  of  deism.  Instead  of  the  mechanical  separa- 
tion between  deity  and  humanity  that  was  held  almost- 
up  to  Emerson's  day,  there  comes  a  joining  of  the  two  .^  .Ix: 
by  means  of  a  mediating  principle,  great  nature  itself.  — •  ^,,^^. 
Because  God  is  in  his  world  and  man  is  part  of  that  j  -/vc^^^t. 
world,  it  comes  to  pass  that  man  feels  wuthin  himself  x^t^^  v— ^ 
the  divine  currents,  is  conscious  of  a  universal  soul  J^^I^'^lXv 
within  his  individual  life.  t^—'Ar^- 

There  is  next  the  principle  of  benevolence  in  respect  '  '^"^"^ 
to  the  deity.  It  is  a  good  God  that  has  made  this  goodly  "^  ^^^^^ 
world.     With  this  conviction  there  arises  the  splendid  Ir- 

optimism  in  the  pages  of  the  transcendentalist.  After 
Emerson  had  laid  down  the  fundamental  principles  of 
immanence,  he  takes  up  as  the  first  use  of  nature  that 
of  commodity.  Under  this  general  name  he  ranks  those 
advantages  which  our  senses  owe  to  nature.  By  it  we 
may  explore  that  steady  and  prodigal  provision  that  has 
been  made  for  man's  support  and  delight  on  this  green 
ball  which  floats  him  through  the  heaven,  ...  In  all 
this  there  is  a  close  resemblance  to  the  old  deistie  delight 
in  nature  as  an  embodiment  of  the  divine  goodness. 
But  a  glamor  is  put  upon  it  by  the  poetic  New  Eng- 
lander.  The  argument  for  deistie  design  had  degenerated 
into  such  forms  as  the  Bridgeivater  Treatises,  which  af- 


148  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

forded  a  combination  of  special  providences  with  the 
shallow  sciences  of  the  day.  Now,  the  purpose  or  the 
utility,  or  the  commodity  which  Emerson  found  in  na- 
ture was  not  special  but  general;  not  mechanical,  but 
aesthetic.  Hence  arises  his  poetic  apostrophe:  What 
angels  invented  these  splendid  ornaments,  these  rich 
conveniences,  this  ocean  of  air  above,  this  ocean  of 
water  beneath,  this  firmament  of  earth  between;  this 
zodiac  of  lights,  this  tent  of  dropping  clouds,  this  striped 
coat  of  climates,  this  fourfold  year? 

Immanence  and  benevolence  have  been  combined  in  an 
optimistic  form  of  pantheism.  This  is  in  decided  con- 
trast to  the  pantheism  of  Europe,  which  had  so  often 
tended  towards  the  pessimistic.  On  this  side  of  the 
water  there  was  no  world-weariness,  but  a  joy  of  living 
and  a  true  love  of  the  soil.  This  was  a  new  land  for 
life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness.  There  was 
no  pressure  on  population,  but  a  chance  for  all  men  to 
make  their  way.  The  fact  that  the  ardent  spirit  might 
plant  his  foot  on  the  ladder  of  fortune  had  much  to  do 
with  the  bright  outlook.  When  the  younger  generation 
left  New  England,  men  were  heartened  by  the  reports 
of  their  success  on  the  frontier.  Indeed,  the  winning 
of  the  West  was  a  highly  exciting  and  vivifying  process. 
And,  finally,  while  much  of  the  pessimism  of  the  cold 
world  may  be  laid  to  the  gray  skies  of  the  northern 
climes,  here,  the  clear  skies,  the  cold  waves,  the  rapid 
changes  in  temperature,  stirred  up  the  blood  and  stimu- 
lated the  animal  spirits.  So  we  find  Emerson  an  op- 
timist, pointing  to  those  "  admirable  stars  of  possibility 
and  the  yet  untouched  continent  of  hope  glittering  with 
all  its  mountains  in  the  vast  west."  It  is  for  these  rea- 
sons also  that  we  find  not  a  single  prophet  of  woe  among 
the  transcendentalists.     Alcott's  optimism  was  carried 


EMERSON,  INTERPRETER  OF  NATURE        149 

almost  to  excess;  he  seldom  saw  anytliing  except  in  the 
fervid  liue  of  rosy  hope.  Thoreau,  though  a  Diogenes, 
was  not  a  Cynic :  he  lived  by  himself,  but  he  lived  joy- 
ously ;  his  withdrawal  from  society,  his  return  to  nature, 
were  made  not  because  he  was  a  fatalist,  but  because  in 
nature  he  found  a  field  where  man  was  free  to  hunt  for 
happiness. 

The  optimism  of  this  philosophic  era  of  good  feeling 
was  extended  from  nature  as  a  whole  to  human  nature. 
Taking  over  the  high  deistic  praises  of  human  goodness,  1 
that  complacency  over  man  and  his  achievements  which 
marked  the  eighteenth  century,  the  younger  generation 
joined  this  to  an  incipient  doctrine  of  development.  If 
nature  is  growing  perfect,  man  as  a  serial  part  of  nature 
is  perfectible.  All  this  explains  the  sudden  outburst  of 
egotistic  optimism  which  took  place  in  New  England. 
In  the  Unitarian  Manifesto  of  1815,  in  the  diaries  of  the 
radical  transcendentalists,  we  find  a  revulsion  against 
Puritanic  pessimism,  and  a  reviling  of  the  doctrine  of 
human  depravity.  In  one  way  all  these  phases  of 
thought  do  not  obtain  in  Emerson's  case.  It  was  a 
sign  of  his  precocity  that  he  very  earlj'-  decided  that  this 
was  a  good  world,  and  the  men  in  it  good ;  that  deity 
was  kindly  disposed  towards  all,  and  that  all  men  were 
open  to  the  solicitations  of  the  spirit.  And  yet  Emer- 
son's life  was  not  without  adversity.  He  had  fought 
against  poverty,  ill  health,  and  family  losses ;  and  it  was 
through  his  own  courage  that,  after  a  period  of  mor- 
bidity and  doubt,  he  came  out  with  that  serenity  of  faith 
that  characterized  the  essay  on  Nature  and  all  he  wrote 
thereafter. 

To  the  last  principle  of  Emerson's  thought  we  need 
devote  but  a  few  words.  That  self-reliance  on  which  he 
dwelt  is  to  he  derived   from  the  doctrine  of  the  per- 


150  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

fectibility  of  man.  It  is  a  result  of  the  deistic  com- 
placency, and  not,  as  has  often  been  held,  a  corollary 
of  Calvinism,  Puritans  have  been  called  self-reliant; 
they  were,  but  not  through  the  principles  of  their  creed. 
Amongst  the  best  of  them,  their  self-reliance  was  naught 
but  God-reliance,  A  logical  Calvinist  could  not  depend 
on  himself,  but  had  to  lean  on  Providence.  Amongst 
the  weak  brethren  was  this  especially  true.  The  Cal- 
vinist who  believed  in  particular  providences  was  al- 
ways begging  for  favors  from  his  God.  We  need  but 
note  Cotton  Mather's  agonies  of  soul  over  his  impotence 
to  save  himself  and  the  sniffling  spirit  with  which  he 
sought  for  special  privileges.  Neither  one  way  nor  the 
other  can  self-reliance  be  derived  from  the  doctrines  of 
Puritanism.  There  were  other  factors  at  work;  British 
blood  and  American  achievements  were  the  real  causes 
for  the  new  spirit.  The  whining  attitude,  which  at  times 
possessed  New  England's  religionists,  passed  rapidly 
away  after  the  second  war  with  England.  With  their 
eyes  on  the  naval  victories  of  that  day,  the  commonalty 
became  so  excessively  self-reliant  that,  in  a  cant  phrase 
of  the  times,  they  could  whip  the  universe.  Yet  the 
country  was  better  represented  by  those  of  more  quiet 
minds,  who  came  to  rely  on  themselves  and  not  on  a 
reputation.  Descendants  of  the  Puritans,  they  longed 
for  spiritual  improvement  and  sought  it  in  the  oneness 
of  the  individual  with  nature. 

"\  It  is  here  that  there  arises  a  contradiction  between  the 
reliance  on  self  and  the  reliance  on  the  not-self.  Emer- 
son resolved  this  contradiction  by  making  the  two,  one. 
Because  man  is  a  part  of  nature,  because  nature  par- 
takes of  deity,  there  is  an  unbreakable  bond  between 
these  elements.  Man  may  rely  on  his  reason  because  this 
reason  is  not  to  be  distinguished  from  the  divine  essence. 


EMERSON,  INTERPRETER  OF  NATURE        151 

This  is  the  paradox  of  pantheism  at  which  Emerson  ulti- 
mately arrived.  But  in  order  that  there  may  be  no 
abrupt  identification  between  human  and  divine,  he 
brings  in  a  third  factor,  the  external  world,  which  gives 
to  man  the  perpetual  presence  of  the  sublime. 

The  inference  may  still  be  made  that  if  Emerson  was  a 
pantheist,  he  must  be  a  determinist  and  a  fatalist.  We 
nevertheless  find  him  reiterating  his  belief  in  the  dig- 
nity of  human  nature  and  the  excellence  of  self-reliance. 
How  may  this  be  reconciled  with  his  statement  that 
nature  is  an  embodied  law  whose  divine  order  is  in- 
violable to  us?  In  reply  we  may  point  out  that  this  is 
not  the  Puritanic  fatalism  where  nature  is  arbitrary, 
full  of  strange  and  overwhelming  mischances.  No, 
Emerson  is  opposed  to  arbitrary  decrees;  to  him  nature 
is  inviolable,  but  never  inscrutable.  Provided  man  is 
open  to  the  solicitations  of  the  spirit,  nature  is  essen- 
tially comprehensible  and  rational. 

In  this  Emerson  shows  his  Americanism.  His  deter- 
minism is  modified  in  a  novel  way.  It  does  not  resem- 
ble the  European  fatalism  derived  from  a  philosophy 
of  the  unconscious,  based  upon  a  blind  will  working  in 
us,  we  know  not  how.  As  a  true  son  of  the  soil  Emerson 
is  willing  to  be  ruled,  but  not  as  a  puppet  worked  from 
behind  the  scenes.  If  he  obeys  the  law  like  a  good  citi- 
zen, he  wants  to  know  how  he  is  ruled.  As  in  the  proper 
form  of  the  American  government,  from  the  town  meet- 
ing to  the  administration  of  Washington,  he  expects  to 
find  things  run  in  an  open  and  above-board  fashion. 
And  thus  he  comes  to  put  this  political  interpretation 
upon  nature:  It  is  something  to  be  scrutinized  in  its 
actions;  it  also  stands  as  a  representative  of  the  will 
of  man. 

Nature  is  open  to  scrutiny  first  by  symbol isjp ;  it  al- 


\-'WUiaX« 


0 


ic^ 


152  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

ways  has  a  meaning;  it  can  be  interpreted.  The  use  of 
j  natural  history,  says  the  transcendentalist,  is  to  give 
•  us  aid  in  supernatural  history.  Thus  arises  that  radi- 
calism in  Emerson's  philosophy  which  did  so  much  to 
soften  its  apparent  determinism.  In  its  first  aspects 
nature  seems  a  discipline ;  its  function  that  of  a  task- 
master, and  a  mere  obedient  subject  to  that  law  which  is 
king  of  kings.  But  Emerson,  as  a  representative  of  a 
self-ruling  people,  will  not  allow  that  this  is  a  final  end 
of  nature.  Law  as  law  is  not  paramount.  Mere  sci- 
entific formulae  are  not  enough.  He  declares  that  we 
must  seek  for  a  higher  end  and  purpose,  a  spiritual  prin- 
ciple running  through  all  phenomtua.  So  idealism  is 
an  hypothesis  to  account  for  nature  on  other  principles 
than  those  of  carpentry  and  chemistry,  and  the  spiritual 
principle  should  demonstrate  itself  to  the  end.  In  the 
mastery  of  nature,  man  has  first  to  learn  its  waj^s.  .  .  . 
By  discipline  is  the  unspeakable  but  intelligible  and  prac- 
ticable meaning  of  the  world  conveyed  to  man,  the  mor- 
tal pupil  in  every  object  of  sense.  But,  adds  the  idealist, 
I  man  as  part  of  the  universe  has  an  immediate  and  in- 
tuitive knowledge  of  its  innermost  essence,  and  thus  may 
'he  transcend  those  very  objects  of  sense.  Therefore,  he 
continues,  if  the  reason  be  stimulated  to  more  earnest 
vision,  outlines  and  surfaces  become  transparent,  and 
are  no  longer  seen;  causes  and  spirits  are  seen  through 
them. 

This  is  the  turning  point  in  the  resolution  of  deter- 
minism. Knowledge  is  power  and  by  this  power  man  is 
able  to  pierce  through  the  veil  and  to  find  that  nature, 
I  which  before  this  seemed  all-powerful,  has  a  secondary 
place.  Emerson  carries  out  his  reasoning  in  the  follow- 
ing remarkable  passage:  But  whilst  avc  acquiesce  en- 
tirely in  the  permanence  of  natural  laws,  the  question  of 


EMERSON,  INTERPRETER  OF  NATURE        153 

the  absolute  existence  of  nature  remains  open.    It  is  the 
uniform  effect  of  culture  on  the  human  mind,  not  to 
shake  our  faith  in  the  stability  of  particular  phenomena, 
as  of  heat,  water,  azote ;  but  to  lead  us  to  regard  nature 
as  a  phenomenon,  not  a  substance ;  to  attribute  necessary  \ 
existence  to  spirit ;  to  esteem  nature  as  an  accident  and  / 
an  effect.  .    .    .  With  this  assertion  of  the  primac^LJif  \ 
reason  a  strict  determinism  vanishes.     The  great  prin- 
ciple is  not  fatality,  but  regularity;  nature  is  no  longer 
dominant  over  man  but  man  learns  to  manipulate  na- 
ture.    The  sensual  man,  continues  Emerson,  conforms 
thoughts  to  things;  but  the  poet  conforms  things  to  his 
thoughts.     The  one  esteems  nature  as  rooted  and  fast, 
the  other  as  fluid ;  he  impresses  his  being  thereon ;  to  him 
the  refractor}^  world  is  ductile  and  flexible. 

Emerson  had  stated  that  nature's  divine  order  was 
inviolable  to  us;  he  now  goes  so  far  as  to  make  that 
nature  a  mere  appendix  to  the  soul.  This  reversal  of 
a  former  judgment  needs  to  be  explained.  How  may  we 
reconcile  the  discrepancy  as  to  the  over-lordship  of  man  ? 
It  is  by  recalling  the  kinship  that  exists  between  man 
and  the  world.  Both  are  imbued  with  reason,  in  each  is 
a  common  essence.  The  solid-seeming  block  of  matter 
has  been  per^-aded  and  dissolved  by  a  thought ;  this  feeble 
human  being  has  penetrated  the  vast  masses  of  nature 
with  an  informing  soul,  and  recognized  itself  in  their 
harmony,  that  is,  seized  their  law. 

In  offering  this  solution  Emerson  has  united  two  sides 
of  his  nature,  his  law-abiding  disposition  and  his  strain 
of  Puritanism.  The  one  side  acknowledges  conscious 
law  as  king  of  kings ;  the  other  contemns  the  un.substan- 
tial  shows  of  the  world.  But  again,  it  may  be  asked,  does 
not  the  latter  belief  preclude  the  former?  If  all  is  an 
illusion,  is  not  nature's  law  an  illusion?    Emerson,  with 


// 


^-' 


154  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

his  inherent  common  sense,  cannot  so  answer.     He  re- 
marks that  while  the  devotee  flouts  nature,  he  loves  it, 
for  the  advantage  of  the  ideal  theoiy  over  the  popular 
faith  is  that  it  transcends  the  world  in  precisely  that 
I  view  which  is  most  desirable  to  the  mind, — a  "  vast  pic- 
ture which  God  paints  on  the  instant  eternity  for  the 
contemplation  of  the  soul."     In  this  theorizing  some 
may  say  there  is  shallo\Miess ;  that  it  is  merely  the  artist 's 
way  of  working ;  that  it  attempts  to  wipe  out  all  nature 
as  an  unsubstantial  pageant.     This  is  a  misinterpreta- 
tion,    Emersjon  is.  no  lliusionistj,Jbut_arL  ideal  realist. 
^C*-  ■        Nature  is  not  an  accident,  in  the  sense  of  being  a  mere 
^<  V       chance  happening,  but  rather  in  the  sense  of  being  the 
j:  *•*    .  (manifestation  of  a  substance  most  profound  and  real.    So 
-^      \  he  clings  to  this  brave  lodging,  wherein  man  is  harbored, 
^"^   and  holds  that  this  is  the  use  of  nature,  that  it  is  faith- 
ful to  the  cause  whence  it  had  its  origin.     It  always 
I  speaks  of  spirit.    It  suggests  the  absolute.    It  is  a  per- 
1  petual  effect.    It  is  a  great  shadow  pointing  always  to 
*  the  sun  behind  us. 

2.   The  Sources  of  Transcendentalism 

In   his   definitive    address   on   the   Transcendentalist 
^merson  remarks  that  the  first  thing  we  have  to  say  re- 
j^    specting  what  are  called  the  new  views  here  in  New 
r  England  at  the  present  time,  is  that  they  are  not  new, 
-^'^*    I  but  the  very  oldest  thoughts  cast  into  the  mold  of  these 
'new  times.    Upon  this  disavowal  there  follows  a  defini- 
tion of  the  movement  in  which  the  author  was  enmeshed. 
What  is  properly  called  transcendentalism  among  us, 
he  continues,  is  idealism,  idealism  as  it  appears  in  1842. 
As  such  it  is  a  protest  against  materialism.    In  place  of 
experience,  of  the  data  of  the  senses,  of  the  force  of  cir- 


1^ 


X*' 


THE  SOURCES  OF  TRANSCENDENTALISM       155 

cumstances,  of  the  animal  wants  of  man,  it  insists  on 
consciousness,  on  the  power  of  thought  and  of  will,  on 
inspiration,  on  individual  culture.  Again,  while  the 
materialist  respects  sensible  masses,  the  idealist  has  an- 
other measure  which  is  metaphysical,  namely  the  rank 
which  things  themselves  take  in  his  consciousness;  not 
at  all  the  size  or  appearance.  He  does  not  respect  labor, 
or  the  products  of  labor,  namely  property,  otherwise  than 
as  a  manifold  symbol,  illustrating  with  wonderful  fidelity 
of  details  the  law  of  being.  His  experience  inclines  him 
to  behold  the  procession  of  facts  you  call  the  world,  as 
flowing  perpetually  outward  from  an  invisible  un- 
sounded center  in  himself.  Finally,  he  believes  in 
miracle,  in  the  perpetual  openness  of  the  human  mind  to 
new  influx  of  light  and  power;  he  believes  in  inspiration 
and  in  ecstasy. 

It  is  obvious  from  this  confession  of  philosophic  faith 
that  New  England  transcendentalism  was,  in  many 
points,  only  a  new  name  for  old  ways  of  thinking. 
Clearly  did  it  re-echo  the  voice  of  the  past:  that  of 
Plato  in  its  doctrines  of  the  scale  of  being  and  of  the 
symbolism  of  nature,  that  of  Plotinus  in  its  insistence  on 
emanation  and  on  ecstasy.  And  as  Emer.son  was  not  un- 
mindful of  his  debt  to  antiquity,  so  also  was  he  conscious 
of  more  recent  influences.  Many,  he  recalls,  have  been 
the  prophets  and  heralds  of  the  transcendental  philos- 
ophy, for  this  way  of  thinking,  falling  on  prelatieal 
times,  made  Puritans  and  Quakers ;  and  falling  on  Uni- 
tarian and  commercial  times  makes  the  peculiar  shades 
of  idealism  which  we  know. 

Thus  far  Emerson  has  suggested  many  sources  of  his 
thought,— from  Platonism  to  Puritanism,  from  Neo- 
Platonism  to  Unitarianism.  P»ut  not  until  this  point 
does   he   mention   that    name   above   all   names   which 


^ 


156  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

popular  opinion  has  held  to  be  the  fount  and  origin 
of  the  New  England  transcendentalism.  It  is  well 
known  to  most  of  my  audience,  he  explains,  that  the 
idealism  of  the  present  day  acquired  the  name  of 
Transcendentalism  from  the  use  of  that  term  by  Im- 
manuel  Kant  of  Konigsberg,  who  replied  to  the  skep- 
/ '  fieal  philosophy  of  Locke,  which  insisted  that  there 
was  nothing  in  the  intellect  which  was  not  previ- 
ously in  the  experience  of  the  senses,  by  showing  that 
there  was  a  very  important  class  of  ideas  or  imperative 
forms,  which  did  not  come  by  experience,  but  through 
which  experience  was  acquired ;  that  these  were  intuitions 
pf  the  mind  itself;  and  he  denominated  them  Tran- 
^^scendeniaTforms.'  The  extraordinary  profoundness  and 
precision  of  that  man 's  thinking  have  given  vogue  to  his 
nomenclature  in  Europe  and  America,  to  that  extent 
that  whatever  belongs  to  the  class  of  intuitive  thought 
is  popularly  called  at  the  present  day  transcendental. 

Emerson  has  suggested  three  sources  of  his  philosophy 
— Hellenic,  American,  and  Germanic,    As  the  Germanic 
is  considered  the  most  important  it  may  be  left  to  the  last ; 
only  after  other  possible  alternatives  have  been  weighed 
can  we  decide  upon  the  alleged  preponderance  of  the 
Teutonic  influences.    So,  too,  of  the  nearer  native  influ- 
ences there  must  be  taken  into  account  the  reactions 
^.    from  the  movements  current  in  the  stream  of  Emerson 's 
li     own  life.    Thus,  in  the  way  of  revulsion,  he  developed 
\     from  the  Hobbite  materialism  a  preference  for  the  in- 
stinctive and  intuitive;  from  the  Lockean  negation  of 
i    innate  ideas  the  assertion  of  subjective  principles   of 
I    reason;  from  the  Humean  skepticism  the  avowal  of  a 
I    faculty  transcending  the  senses  and  the  understanding. 
/_2— III  addition,  there  were  other  forms  of  thought,  actually 
naturalized  in  the  land,  containing  the  very  elements  of 


THE  SOURCES  OF  TRANSCENDENTALISM   157 

transcendentalism  which  Emerson  was  destined  to  ac- 
quire. Thus,  Unitarianism  furnished  him  with  its  lib- 
erality, Quakerism  with  its  mystic  spirit,  and  Puritanism 
with  its  individualism.  This  was  the  trinity  of  powers 
that  energized  his  growing  mind.  Born  eighth  in  a  line 
of  Puritan  divines,  he  received  as  his  heritage  discipline 
without  dogma ;  inclined  by  this  heritage  toward  the 
interior  or  hidden  life,  he  was  prepared  to  welcome  the 
habit  of  introspection  and  solitude.  But,  above  all,  liv- 
ing in  the  transitional  era  of  Unitarianism,  he  was  sub- 
ject to  all  the  varying  forces  of  which  that  movement  was 
the  resultant. 

The  resolution  of  these  forces  has  been  attempted, 
but  not  from  the  philosophic  point  of  view.  It  has  been 
pointed  out  bow  the  old  Calvinistic  stock  split  into  two 
branches — orthodox  and  Unitarian,  and  the  Unitarian 
again  into  conservative  and  transcendental.  Such  is  the 
familj'  tree  of  the  New  England  mind  in  black  and  white. 
But  obviously  we  need  a  greater  variety  of  hues  to  give 
its  natural  appearance,  to  explain  the  transition  from 
the  mere  light  and  shade  of  Calvinism  to  the  highly 
colored  emotionalism  of  radical  transcendentalism.  That 
transition  forms  a  veritable  speculative  spectrum  of  the 
times.  In  New  England  men  had  passed  througli  various 
phases:  Puritanism  had  sought  the  purity  of  faith;  in 
the  worship  of  a  transcendent  Absolute  the  ascription  of 
any  feeling  was  deemed  to  stain  the  white  radiance  of 
eternity.  Next,  Calvinism  was  succeeded  by  deism,  the 
worship  of  deity  by  the  worship  of  humanity,  and  with 
the  succession  there  came  a  change  towards  the  warmer 
tones  of  emotion.  Lastly,  arose  a  true  philosophy  of 
feeling,  for  romanticism  discovered  a  division  between 
those  Unitarians  who  were  content  with  the  cold  light  of 
reason  and  those  who  preferred  the  rosier  hues  of  en- 


>y 


158  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

thusiasm  and  ecstasy.  Romanticism  has  been  properly- 
given  as  the  cause  of  the  transition  from  coldness  to 
warmth,  from  sense  to  sensibility.  Before  this  there  was 
little  to  satisfy  the  heart.  Just  as  the  Most  High  God 
of  the  Puritans  had  degenerated  into  a  mere  dispenser  of 
special  providences,  so  the  light  of  reason  of  the  deistie 
rationalists  had  faded  out  into  the  twilight  of  Humean 
skepticism — "  the  frigid  and  empty  theism  "  against 
which  Emerson  rebelled.  Unitarianism  had  suffered 
from  a  heart-withering  philosophy.  As  Channing  put 
it,  men  must  look  to  other  schools  for  the  thoughts  to 
thrill  them,  to  touch  the  most  inward  springs,  and  dis- 
close the  depths  of  their  own  souls. 

Whence  were  to  come  these  new  thoughts,  half  desired, 
half  feared?  It  was  the  romantic  movement  as  it  took 
the  several  forms  of  French  naturalism,  English  pan- 
theism, and  German  idealism  that  was  to  furnish  the 
influences.  Of  these  three  forms  the  first  had  least 
weight.  Rousseau's  return  to  nature  came  to  be  inter- 
preted as  a  return  to  natural  passion,  and  the  Gallic 
materialism  to  be  confused  with  the  excesses  of  the  mob ; 
indeed  the  New  England  Federalists  turned  a  cold 
shoulder  upon  the  rights  of  man  as  exemplified  in  the 
^         French  Revolution.    Thus,  at  the  age  of  nineteen,  Emer- 


r 


<  j^  son  himself  confesses  his  belief  that  nobody  now  regards 
'^ /  Ithe  maxim  ''  all  men  are  born  equal,"  as  anything  more 
than  a  convenient  hypothesis  or  an  extravagant  declama- 
tion. Of  the  English  romantic  influences  it  was  the 
poetic  pantheism  of  the  Lake  School  that  so  warmed  the 
heart  of  Emerson.  The  old  Puritanic  aloofness  from  the 
world,  the  conviction  that  matter  and  spirit  are  essen- 
tially alien,  was  now  giving  way  to  a  feeling  of  kinship 
between  human  nature  and  the  world  of  nature. 
To  come  to  the  crucial  point.    It  has  been  commonly 


THE  SOURCES  OF  TRANSCENDENTALISM   159 

thought  that  the  transcendentalists  early  partook  of  the 
German  idealism;  that  from  across  the  Rhine  earae  the 
fresh  breezes  that  drove  away  the  "  pale  negations  of 
Boston  Unitarianism."  It  was  in  1820  that  Edward 
Everett,  George  Bancroft,  and  George  Ticknor  returned 
to  America  from  Goettingen.  Yet  of  these  men  Emerson, 
in  this  connection,  mentions  but  one,  and  gives  no  hint 
that  he  imported  a  knowledge  of  technical  transcendental- 
ism. Germany,  Emerson  recalled  later,  had  created  criti- 
cism in  vain  for  us  until  Edward  Everett  returned  from 
his  five  years  in  Europe  and  brought  to  Cambridge  his 
rich  results  ...  he  made  us  for  the  first  time  acquainted 
with  Wolff's  theory  of  the  Homeric  writings  and  witli 
the  criticism  of  Heine. 

This  is  the  fullest  statement,  before  his  first  published 
book  Nature,  that  the  author  makes  as  to  the  influence  of 
Germany  upon  his  mind.  Previous  to  1836  we  find  in 
his  Journals  only  these  nominal  references:  to  Kant 
once ;  to  Fichte  thrice ;  to  Schelling  twice ;  to  Hegel  twice. 
Indeed  the  American's  knowledge  of  German  meta- 
physics was  slight  and  secondary.  He  made  a  few  ex- 
tracts in  his  blotter  from  a  translation  of  Fichte.  not 
knowing  as  yet  the  tongue  of  the  original.  Later,  at  the 
solicitation  of  Carlyle,  he  learned  to  read  the  works  of 
Goethe,  yet  even  here  he  found  but  a  confirmation  of  his 
own  beliefs  and  his  sense  of  originality  did  not  forsake 
him.  Five  months  before  the  proof-sheets  of  Nature 
reached  him  he  made  this  complacent  note:  Only  last 
evening  I  find  the  following  sentence  in  Goethe,  a  com- 
ment and  consent  to  my  speculations  on  the  All  in  Each 
in  Nature  this  last  week. 

In  truth  it  may  be  repeated  that  Emerson's  knowledge' 
of  the  German  schools  was  not  only  slight,  but  second- 
ary, when  he  could  declare  that  the  love  of  the  vast  came 


160  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

from  Germany  to  America  through  Coleridge.  How  the 
latter  became  the  medium  through  the  American  edition 
of  his  Aids  to  Reflection  we  shall  consider  subsequently; 
meanwhile  we  must  seek  for  other  and  earlier  tendencies 
that  brought  the  Massachusetts  leader  into  the  tran- 
scendental drift.  Of  these  tendencies  he  was  more  or  less 
unconscious,  for  the  name  of  transcendentalism,  he  as- 
serts, was  given  nobody  knows  by  whom,  or  when  it  was 
first  applied. 

Yet  for  us,  looking  back  on  those  times,  it  is  not  im- 
possible to  point  out  certain  definite  factors  that  led  to 
the  Emersonian  type  of  mind.  The  prime  factor  was 
British.  It  was  an  Anglo-American  environment  that 
was  furnished  by  the  Boston  of  that  day.  Here  two 
forms  of  thought  led  to  the  transcendental  strain:  the 
Irish  idealism  of  George  Berkeley,  the  English  idealism 
of  the  Cambridge  and  Oxford  Platonists.  Of  the  former 
there  were  few  general  traces,  for  though  the  good  bishop 
had  lived  for  three  years  in  Rhode  Island  his  views,  as 
those  of  an  Anglican  churchman,  were  not  acceptable  to 
Massachusetts  Congregationalists.  And  yet  we  have  a 
record  of  the  great  immaterialist 's  power  over  Emerson 
when  he  said:  "  I  know  but  one  solution  to  my  nature 
and  relations,  which  I  find  in  remembering  the  joy  with 
which  in  my  boyhood  I  caught  the  first  hint  of  the  Ber- 
keleian  philosophy,  and  which  I  certainly  never  lost 
sight  of  afterwards."  To  what  extent  Berkeley  held 
sway  over  Emerson  it  would  be  hard  to  say,  for  the  kin- 
dred beliefs  in  sense  symbolism  and  the  divine  visual 
language  the  latter  might  have  drawn  from  the  Platoniz- 
ing  poets.  Such  were  Quarles  and  Vaughan  and  espe- 
cially George  Herbert,  from  whom  Emerson  was  so  fond 
of  quoting  lines  that  taught  the  congruity  between  things 
and  thoughts,  between  forms  and  mind. 


THE  SOURCES  OF  TRANSCENDENTALISM   IGl 

Such  were  certain  of  the  earlier  idealistic  influences 
upon  the  young  New  Englander.  Yet  more  important 
than  the  Irish  idealist,  and  the  poetic  symbolists,  was 
the  influence  of  the  older  English  lines.  That  influence 
was  of  double  significance,  since  through  men  like  Cud- 
worth  and  More,  Norris  and  Collier,  Emerson  was  led  to 
manifest  his  spiritual  affinity  with  both  Kant  and  Plato. 
How  far  the  Koenigsberger  was  anticipated  by  the  Cam- 
bridge and  Oxford  Platonists  has  been  suggested  by 
William  James  and  carried  out  by  Arthur  Lovejoy.  For 
example,  in  Cudworth's  True  Intellectual  System  of  the 
Universe  are  to  be  discovered  not  only  a  general  em- 
phasis on  nativism,  and  preference  for  the  innate  and 
intuitive  over  the  empirical  and  sensualistic,  but  also 
an  anticipation  of  the  Kantian  a  priori  concepts  of  ob- 
jects and  the  wisdom  of  pure  speculative  reason.  It 
was  in  Cudworth  that  Emerson  had  read  from  time  to 
time  for  years,  and  through  him,  in  his  college  days,  had 
obtained  his  first  glimpse  into  Plato.  Again  it  was  Cud- 
worth  who  prepared  the  way  for  Coleridge,  and  Coleridge 
who  furnished  the  easiest  way  to  Kant  for  English  read- 
ers. That  the  Aids  to  Reflection  should  have  been  issued 
as  early  as  1829  in  New  England  is  not  surprising, 
when  we  remember  that  Emerson  declared  that  the  feel- 
ing of  the  Infinite  finds  a  most  genial  climate  in  the 
American  mind.  So  the  Cambridge  Platonist  opened  the 
way  back  to  his  ancient  master.  Of  Plato  Emerson  ex- 
claims: "  I  hesitate  to  speak  lest  there  should  be  no  end. 
He  contains  the  future,  as  he  came  out  of  the  past." 
Statements  like  these  call  for  a  reversal  of  the  ordinary 
judgment  as  to  the  inspiration  of  our  foremost  tran- 
scendentalist.  In  truth  it  wa.s  the  philosopher  of  the 
Academy  and  not  of  Koenigsberg  who,  by  his  own  early 
confession,  was  Emerson's  master.    As  is  shown  by  that 


102  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

essay  in  Representative  Men  he  was  almost  convinced 
that  "  transcendental  truths  have  a  kind  of  filial  retro- 
spect to  Plato  and  the  Greeks." 

We  have  examined  the  three  suggested  sources  for 
the  Emersonian  philosophy,  namely  the  Germanic,  Brit- 
ish, and  Hellenic.  The  first,  in  the  prevalent  opinion, 
is  held  to  be  paramount,  but  that  opinion  cannot  be  ad- 
hered to  if  the  two  others  will  account  for  the  facts.  The 
acquisition  of  the  Kantian  system  was  a  well-nigh  im- 
possible task  in  a  land  where  German  literature  was,  as 
yet,  known  only  by  name.  For  instance,  the  first  refer- 
ence to  Immanuel  Kant  in  the  country  was  given  in  a 
Philadelphia  magazine  of  1798,  and  that  reference  was 
only  at  second  hand,  while  the  first  decent  exposition  of 
the  Critique  of  Pure  Reason  was  published  by  a  Yale 
graduate  in  1842.  Meanwhile  in  Massachusetts,  in  the 
period  half-way  between  these  dates,  there  was  a  piti- 
able dearth  of  literature  on  the  subject.  George  Ticknor, 
before  he  set  sail  for  Goettingen  in  1815,  was  obliged 
to  send  to  New  Hampshire,  ' '  where  he  learned  there  was 
■  a  German  dictionary. "  It  is  true  that  in  the  same  year 
there  was  for  sale  by  a  Boston  bookseller  a  London  trans- 
lation of  the  Elements  of  the  Critical  Pliilosophy,  but 
it  was  not  for  some  years  later  that  the  little  band  of 
enthusiasts  fi'om  Goettingen  returned  to  Harvard.  This 
was  the  band,  headed  by  Edward  Everett,  that  Emerson 
mentions  as  arousing  an  interest  in  German  modes  of 
criticism.  Now  that  eriti€isTiT;"i1r--wilLfee_recalled,  was 
more  literary  than  philosophical. 

In  the  meantime  Emerson 's  drift  towards  idealism  had 
been  hastened  more  by  a  revulsion  against  the  current 
metaphysie  than  by  a  knowledge  of  the  now.     Shortly 
before  he  came  of  age,  he  protested  against  the-coU^g^ 
curriculum  with  its  emphasis  on  "  reasoning  machines," 


THE  SOURCES  OF  TRANSCENDENTALISM   1G3 

such  as  Locke,  and  Clarke,  aad-J^ayidllume.  In  his,^^ 
required  studies  lie  Had  received  such  an  overdose  of  the 
Essay  an  Iluman  Understanding  that  he  wrote  that 
"  while  the  inspired  poets  will  be  Platonists,  the  dull 
men  will  be  Lockeists."  It  is  this  dislike  of  the  sensa- 
tionalistic  denial  of  innatejdeas  that  broqght  out  Emer- 
son's latent  transcendentalism.  Against  empiricism  he,_ 
protested  that  there  were  truths  higher  than  those  given 
by  experience;  against  sensationalism  that  there  were 
intuitions  higher  than  those  given  by  the  senses.  So, 
from  a  temperamental  reaction  Emerson  went  back  to 
the  English  Platonists  and  through  them  back  to  the 
ancients.  Immediately  after  the  issuance  of  his  first  work 
he  writes :  Any  history  of  philosophy  fortifies  mj^  faith 
by  showing  me  that  what  high  dogmas  I  had  supposed 
were  the  rare  and  late  fruit  of  a  cumulative  culture. — 
and  only  now  possible  to  some  recent  Kant  or  Fichte. — 
were  the  prompt  improvisations  of  the  earliest  in- 
quirers. -  _ 

Such  confessions  show  how  lastingly  Hellenism  was^ 
impress£d_upon  the  mind  of  Emerson.  As  a  boy  in  col- 
lege, through  Cudworth's  citations,  he  had  come  upon 
Plato;  later  he  added  that  "  it  was  a  great  day  in  a 
man's  life  when  he  first  read  the  Symposium."  Lastly 
there  was  the  notable  essay  in  Representative  Men  show- 
ing that  Plato  forms  the  most  continuously  powerful  in- 
fluence in  Emerson 's  thinking.  ^Moreover,  we  know  from 
new  sources  that  the  ancients  were  Emerson's  chief  teach- 
ers in  transcendentalism.  The  Journals  tell  us  how  as 
an  undergraduate,  having  no  faculty  for  mathematics,  he 
was  wont  to  console  himself  with  Plutarch  and  Plato 
at  night ;  how.  again,  he  considered  himself,  and  not  his 
instructors,  the  true  philosopher  in  college,  becau.se  he 
read  for  "  lustres  "  in  Plato;  how,  finally,  ho  sought 


164  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

Coleridge  in  England  and  from  himJearaad-Jliat  the 
problem  of  philosophy,  aecorclmg  to  Plato,  is  for  all  that 
exists  conditionally,  to  find  a  ground  unconditioned  and 
absolute. 

Three -y«ftrs  after  the  visit  to  Coleridge,  Emerson 
utilized  this  opinion  as  his  definition  of  idealism  in  his 
first  book,  entitled  Nature.  How  largely  that  work  was 
woven  out  of  the  shining  fabric  of  antiquity  can  be  seen 
from  an  analysis  of  its  contents.  The  original  edition 
has  for  its  motto  a  sentence  of  Plotinus:  "  Nature  is 
but  an  image  or  imitation  of  wisdom,  the  last  thing  of  the 
soul."  The  same  author  furnishes  the  grounds  for  that 
baffling  dualism  which  Emerson  ever  sought  to  resolve 
into  its  spiritual  elements.  Plotinus  declares:  "  What 
the  world  ends  in,  therefore,  is  matter  and  reason,  but 
that  from  which  it  arose,  and  by  which  it  is  good,  is 
soul."  In  like  manner  Emerson,  giving  as  his  postulate, 
"  philosophically  considered,  the  universe  is  composed  of 
nature  and  the  soul,"  goes  on  to  sublimate  nature  in 
those  sections  which  begin  with  Commodity,  pass  through 
Symbolism,  and  end  in  the  doctrine  of  Universal  Spirit, 
or  Over-Soul. 

How  kindred  to  his  own  mind  was  the  ancient  way  of 
thinking  is  clearly  seen  in  the  successive  sections  of  this 
little  book  with  all  its  transport  and  radiancy  of  thought. 
Given  as  our  task  to  interrogate  the  great  apparition  that 
shines  so  peacefully  around  us,  the  lover  of  nature  is 
defined  as  he  whose  mind  and  outward  senses  are  still 
truly  adjusted  to  each  other ;  who  has  retained  the  spirit 
of  infancy  even  in  the  era  of  manhood.  Here  is  the 
Platonic  doctrine  of  reminiscence  which,  as  originally 
suggested  to  Emerson  by  Wordsworth's  Ode  on  the  In- 
timations of  Immortality,  was  carried  out  in  his  own 
boyish  poem,  "  Man  in  the  bush  witk  God  may  meet." 


THE  SOURCES  OF  TRANSCENDENTALISM   1G5 

Again  in  the  section  on  Commodity  we  have  as  the  first  of 
the  fourfold  root  of  the  final  cause  of  nature,  the  doctrine 
of  compensation. — that  all  parts  of  nature  incessantly 
work  into  each  other's  hands  for  the  profit  of  man.  Fol- 
lowing the  lines  of  the  Platonizing  Herbert's  poem  on 
jNIan,  this  is  but  the  expression  of  Emerson's  youthful 
experience  when  he  lay  on  his  bed  pleasing  himself  with 
the  beauty  of  the  Lord's  equilibrium  of  the  universe,  in- 
stead of  shuddering  at  the  terrors  of  his  judgments.  .  .  . 
Also  is  a  nobler  want  of  man  served  by  nature,  namely 
the  love  of  beauty ;  for  such  is  the  meaning  of  the  word 
cosmos ;  as  understood  by  the  Greeks  the  world  demands, 
as  essential  to  its  perfection,  the  presence  of  a  higher, 
spiritual  element.  "While  Emerson  designates  this  want 
of  man  as  Hellenic  he  would  add  to  it  that  fpsthetie 
interest  of  his  own  people, — the  love  of  the  beauty  of 
holiness.  So,  he  adds,  the  problem  of  restoring  to  the 
world  original  and  eternal  beauty  is  solved  by  the  re- 
demption of  the  soul. 

Now  Emerson  approaches  a  cherished  belief — that 
of  nature  as  a  great  symbol.  As  if  following  the  apoca- 
lypse of  loveliness  unfolded  by  Berkeley  in  his  divine 
visual  language,  he  explicitly  states  that  language  is  the 
third  use  which  nature  subserves  to  man  and  has  a  three- 
fold degree:  first,  words  are  the  signs  of  natural  facts; 
again,  particular  natural  facts  are  symbols  of  particu- 
lar spiritual  facts:  every  appearance  in  nature  corre- 
sponds to  some  state  of  the  mind,  for  man  is  conscious  of 
a  universal  soul  within  or  behind  his  individual  life ; 
lastly,  nature  is  the  symbol  of  spirit ;  because  it  is  em- 
blematic the  universe  becomes  transparent,  for  the  light 
of  higher  laws  than  its  own  shines  through  it ;  tliis  is  the 
standing  problem  which  has  exercised  tlie  wonder  and 
study  of  every  fine  genius  since  the  world  began,  from 


166  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

Pythagoras  and  Plato  to  Bacon,  Leibniz,  and  Sweden- 
borg. 

That  nature  is  the  symbol  of  spirit  lies  at  the  bottom  of 
the  TimcEus.     But  the  next  contention  concerning  the 
ethical  import  of  natural  law,  or  what  Emerson  calls  dis- 
cipline, is  not  strictly  Platonic.    In  other  words,  that  the 
axioms  of  physics  apply  to  morals  is  not  of  the  Acad- 
emy but  of  a  later  school,  being  rather  of  Plotinus  than 
of  Plato.     For  this  confusion  two  reasons  have  been 
given, — Emerson's  use  of  Thomas  Taylor's  translation 
of  Plato  which  was  edited  from  the  Neo-Platonic  point 
of  view,  and  Coleridge's  attempt  to  harmonize  Plato's 
philosophy  of  the  good  with  Lord  Bacon's  search  of 
truth.    But  this  is  going  too  far  afield.    There  is  a  more " 
natural  and  more  native  source  for  this  inversion  of 
Platonism.    If  Plato  found  the  idea  of  the  good  giving 
unity  to  the  ideas  in  the  intelligible  world,   Emerson 
found  the  laws  of  the  world  leading  up  to  the  universal 
good,  and  this  because  he  was  in  the  deistic  drift.    Cosmic 
benevolence  was  a  favorite  theme  of  the  Harvard  worth- 
ies.   Even  the  austere  Cotton  Mather,  as  we  recall,  had 
composed  a  cheerful  little  book  entitled,  The  Christian 
Philosopher.    A  Collection  of  the  Best  Discoveries  in 
Nature  with  Eeligious  Improvements.     And  his  more 
genial  successor,  Charles  Chauncy,  issued  his  Benevo- 
lence of  the  Deity,  which  was  in  harmony  with  that  series 
of  Dudleian  lectures  which  were  a  familiar  feature  of 
college  in  Emerson's  undergraduate  days.     It  was  the 
philosophic  age  of  optimism  in  his  own  land  that  left 
their  mild  marks  on  Emerson's  doctrine  of  discipline. 
At  the  opening  of  his  literary  career,  he  feels  noble  emo- 
tions dilating  him  as  his  mind  apprehends,  one  after  an- 
other, the  laws  of  physics.    Later  he  found  the  survey 


THE  SOURCES  OF  TRANSCENDENTALISM   107 

of  cosmical  powers  a  means  of  consolation  in  tlic  dark 
hours  of  private  misfortune. 

The  transcendoutalist  here  discloses  himself  more  than 
a  Platonizer;  he  is  a  modernizer.  Cudworth  opened  to 
Mm  the  Platonic  symbolism ;  * '  analogy -loving  souls  ' ' 
like  Bruno  and  Donne.  Herbert,  Crashaw,  and  Vaughan 
gave  him  its  poetic  form ;  he  himself  now  attempts,  as  an 
higher  synthesis,  the  harmony  of  religion  and  science. 
How  wide  was  his  reading  in  the  latter  subject  may  be 
inferred  from  his  book  lists,  where  are  to  be  found 
mention  of  such  masters  of  science  as  Newton,  Laplace 
and  Hunter,  Linnneus,  Lamarck  and  Herschel,  Owen, 
Lyell,  and  Faraday.  An  earlier  reference  shows  for 
what  end  he  had  been  gathering  these  stores.  As  he 
had  already  declared :  the  religion  that  is  afraid  of  sci- 
ence dishonors  God  and  commits  suicide ;  it  acknowledges 
that  it  is  not  equal  to  the  whole  of  truth,  that  it  legis- 
hites,  tyrannizes,  over  a  village  of  God's  empire,  but  it  is 
not  the  immutable,  universal  law.  But  because  all  things 
are  moral,  and  in  their  boundless  clianges  have  an  un- 
ceasing reference  to  spiritual  nature,  herein  is  appre- 
hended the  unity  of  nature,— all  the  endless  variety  of 
things  make  an  identical  impression. 

Substantiating  his  belief  in  the  essential  unity  of  na- 
ture by  a  reference  to  Xenophanes,  Emerson  now  passes 
to  that  most  central  and  vital  of  his  doctrines.  For  his 
first  lesson  in  idealism  he  recalls  when  as  a  child  he 
amused  himself  in  saying  over  such  common  words  as 
"  black,"  "  white,"  "  board,"  twenty  or  thirty  times 
until  the  words  lo.st  all  meaning  and  fixedness,  and  he 
began  to  doubt  which  was  the  right  name  for  the  thing. 
Now,  a  nobler  doubt  perpetually  suggests  itself  ...  to 
give  a  sufficient  account  of  that  Appearance  we  call  the 
World ;  in  my  utter  impotence  to  tost  the  authenticity 


168  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

of  the  report  of  my  senses,  to  know  whether  the  im- 
pressions they  make  on  me  correspond  with  outlying 
objects,  what  difference  does  it  make,  whether  Orion  is 
up  there  in  heaven,  or  some  god  paints  the  image  in  the 
firmament  of  the  soul?  How  is  the  doubt  resolved? 
By  the  end  for  which  nature  exists;  whether  it  enjoys 
a  substantial  existence  without  or  is  only  in  the  apoca- 
lypse of  the  mind,  it  is  alike  useful  and  alike  venerable 
to  me. 

As  the  section  on  Discipline  suggested  that  the  ethical 
character  so  penetrates  the  bone  and  marrow  of  nature 
as  to  seem  the  end  for  which  it  was  made,  so  that  on 
Idealism  bears  this  notion  out.  Religion,  in  teaching 
that  the  things  that  are  unseen  are  eternal,  does  for 
the  unschooled  what  philosophy  does  for  Berkeley.  It 
discloses  the  whole  circle  of  persons  and  things,  of  actions 
and  events,  as  one  vast  picture  which  God  paints  on  the 
instant  eternity  for  the  contemplation  of  the  soul.  .  .  . 
In  this  ardent  exposition  of  the  divine  visual  language, 
the  Irish  idealist  of  the  eighteenth  century  has  found 
an  American  disciple  in  the  nineteenth.  That  westward 
strand,  whither  Berkeley  came  with  such  high  hopes,  at 
last  brought  forth  a  follower  who  could  sympathetically 
interpret  the  uses  of  nature.  Behind  nature,  throughout 
nature,  says  Emerson,  spirit  is  present ;  one,  and  not  com- 
pound, it  does  not  act  upon  us  from  without,  that  is  in 
space  and  time,  but  spiritually,  or  through  ourselves; 
therefore,  that  spirit,  that  is,  the  Supreme  Being,  does 
not  build  up  nature  around  us,  but  puts  it  forth  through 
us,  as  the  life  of  the  tree  puts  forth  new  branches  and 
leaves  through  the  pores  of  the  old.  .  .  .  Nature  is  thus 
an  incarnation  of  God,  a  projection  of  God;  its  serene 
order  is  inviolable  to  us ;  it  is,  therefore,  to  us,  the  pres- 
ent expositor  of  the  divine  mind. 


THE  SOURCES  OF  TRANSCENDENTALISM   169 

With  this  rhapsody  over  spirit — the  dread  universal 
essence — Emerson  concludes  his  great  essay  on  Nature 
with  a  section  entitled  Prospects.  To  what  end  is  this 
apparition  that  shines  about  us?  A  little  poem  by 
George  Herbert  on  Man  gives  him  the  clew.  "When  the 
English  Platonist  affirms,  "  nothing  we  see  but  means 
our  good,"  the  American,  in  a  like  strain,  exclaims, 
' '  "When  I  behold  a  rich  landscape,  it  is  to  know  why  all 
thought  of  multitude  is  lost  in  a  tranquil  sense  of  unity." 
Here  is  a  final  note  of  mysticism,  of  the  absorption  of 
the  self  in  the  All,  and  with  this  Emerson  rounds  out 
that  Platonism  which  was  his  by  heritage,  by  tempera- 
ment, and  by  training.  By  heritage  he  was  familiar  with 
the  latent  idealistic  teachings  of  the  Puritans  concern- 
ing "  the  unsubstantial  shows  of  the  world  as  vanities, 
dreams,  shadows,  unrealities."  Nevertheless  he  did  not 
accept  the  Puritan's  morbid  and  distorted  use  of  such 
teachings.  I  have,  he  adds,  no  hostility  to  nature,  but  a 
child's  love  for  it.  I  do  not  wish  to  fling  stones  at  my^ 
beautiful  mother.  ...  If  Emerson's  temperament  sweet- 
ened the  strain  of  idealism  handed  down  from  Puritan 
days,  his  training  strengthened  it.  And  that  training, 
it  must  be  insisted,  was  largely  self-training.  It  was  not 
Plato  and  Berkeley,  but  Locke  and  Reid  who  were  im- 
pressed upon  the  boy  in  college,  and  least  of  all  had  the 
Germans  any  effect  upon  his  thought.  As  he  informed  a 
friend,  in  this  connection,  he  need  not  consult  the  Ger-^ 
mans,  but  if  he  Avished  at  any  time  to  know  what  the 
transcendentalists  believed,  he  might  simply  omit  what 
in  his  own  mind  he  added  (to  his  simple  perception)  from 
the  tradition,  and  the  rest  would  be  transcendentalism. 
That  Emwaan_Ka&-JinL_aL:the_^nnanic  type,  but 
rather  a  legitimate  successor  of  the  Brjlisirrnntonizers  is 
further  borne  out  by  the^^irecTTestimony  of  Coleridge, 


170  TRANSCENDENTALISM 

who  contends  that  the  Concord  philosopher  was  one 
of  those  few  Americans  who,  in  opposition  to  the 
current  empiricism,  which  made  all  human  knowledge 
derived  from  sensations,  took  up  with  Berkeley's  ideal- 
ism, which  made  immediate  divine  agency  the  sole  cause 
of  all  the  phenomena  of  the  material  world.  In  regard  to 
Coleridge,  Emerson  had  visited  the  sage  of  liighgate  in 
1833,  but  the  visit  he  pronounced  rather  a  spectacle 
than  a  conversation,  of  no  use  beyond  the  satisfaction  of 
one's  curiosity.  Meanwhile  in  an  adjoining  State  there 
had  been  issued  an  American  edition  of  the  Aid^s  to  Re- 
flection with  a  competent  introduction  by  President 
Marsh,  and  it  was  this  work  which  did  most  to  introduce 
the  modified  German  philosophy  into  our  country. 

If  Emerson  has  any  strain  of  the  foreign  transcenden- 
talism, it  is  in  this  modified  and  mediate  form.  He 
possessed  no  such  direct  knowledge  of  Kant  as  did  Marsh 
or  Murdock ;  in  fact,  his  reading  of  the  German  text  was 
begun  at  Carlyle's  solicitation  only  after  the  publica- 
tion of  Nature,  and  was  confined  largely  to  Goethe,  of 
whom  he  "contrived  to  read  almost  every  volume." 
Now,  although  these  men  may  have  first  brought  Emer- 
son into  direct  contact  with  the  Germans,  he  expressly 
refutes  the  implication  that  he  was  more  of  an  inter- 
preter of  Coleridge  than  an  original  thinker.  And  al- 
though he  had  gained  some  knowledge  of  the  Germans, 
he  lets  it  be  known  that  it  was  not  merely  in  an  imitative 
w^ay.  While  Murdock  utilized  Tenneman  to  compile  his 
own  historical  narrative  of  the  progress  of  speculative 
philosophy  in  modern  times,  Emerson  exclaims  that 
"  the  whole  value  of  opinions  like  Tenneman 's  is  to  in- 
crease my  self -trust  by  demonstrating  what  man  can  be 
and  do."  And,  lastly,  although  in  the  crucial  essay  on 
Nature  he  had  apostrophized  the   Germany  of  mystic 


THE  SOURCES  OF  TRANSCENDENTALISM   17] 

philosophy,  he  now  exclaims :  * '  Leave  me  alono ;  do  not 
teach  me  out  of  Leibniz  or  Schelling.  and  I  shall  find  it 
all  out  myself. ' ' 

Emerson's  son  also  bears  testimony  of  him,  that 
in  his  eighteenth  year  he  was  delighted  with  the 
saying  that  all  goes  back  to  the  ancient  East,  yet 
for  modern  systematic  metaphysics  he  cared  little  and 
seldom  read.  That  characteristic  American  attitude 
of  independence  (despite  the  initial  admission  that 
none  escapes  the  debt  to  past  thought),  is  borne  out  by 
this  supplementary-  statement  from  the  essay  on  Quota- 
tion and  Originality:  "  To  all  that  can  be  said  of  the 
preponderance  of  the  Past,  the  single  word  Genius  is  a 
sufficient  answer.  The  Divine  resides  in  the  new;  and 
the  Divine  never  quotes,  but  is,  and  creates.  .  .  .  Origi- 
nality is  being  one's  self;  genius  is  sensibility  and 
capacity  of  receiving  just  impressions  from  the  external 
world,  and  the  power  of  coordinating  these  after  the 
laws  of  thought.  If  the  thinker  recognizes  the  perpetual 
suggestion  of  the  Supremo  Intellect,  the  oldest  thoughts 
become  new  and  fertile  whilst  he  speaks  them. 


CHAPTER  VII 
EVOLUTIONISM 

1.   The  Forerunners  of  Evolutionism 

The  three  centuries  of  American  thought  present  three 
phases  of  the  doctrine  of  evolution.    To  summarize  these 

r  phases  we  may  conveniently  use  the  Comtean  formula  of 
the  law  of  the  three  stages.  In  the  seventeenth  century 
the  interest  was  theological :  evolution — if  such  it  may  be 
called — was  an  unfolding  of  the  divine  plan  according 
to  the  mere  good  pleasure  of  the  Most  High.  In  the 
eighteenth   the   interest  was   metaphysical :   the   divine 

Vplan  became  rationalized,  evidences  of  design  were  dili- 
gently sought  after,  man's  task  was  to  discover  God's 
\     ways  of  working  in  the  world.     In  the  nineteenth  the 
interest  became  positive:  only  after  theology  and  tele- 
ology had  been  left  behind  was  it  possible  to  fasten  atten- 
tion on  evolution  in  the  stricter  modern  sense  of  epi- 
genesis,  of  the  origin  of  species,  of  the  descent  of  man. 
In  brief,  the  history  of  evolution  in  America,  as  in  Eu- 
i    rope,   has   been  from  the   cosmic   to  the   organic,   has 
\  passed  through   the   logical   phases  from  supernatural 
1  election  to  natural  selection. 

*^"  As  in  other  speculative  movements  the  development 
of  the  doctrine  of  evolution  exliibits  a  parallel  growth 
with  that  abroad.  This  does  not  imply  a  slavish  adher- 
ence to  foreign  opinion,  but  a  common  pedigree  and  a 
common  logical  sequence.  There  is  a  continuity  of 
thought  in  one  case  as  in  the  other,  but  that  continuity, 

172 


THE  FORERUNNERS  OF  EVOLUTIONISM      173 

on  this  side  of  tlie  water,  has  uot  yet  been  traced  in 
its  entirety. 

In  the  beginning  there  is,  of  course,  great  indebted- 
ness to  former  siiggestors.    Here  the  Greeks  lead.    Aris- 
totle, though  confounded  with  the  Scholastics,  and  ranted 
against  by  such  pious  worthies  as  Cotton  Mather,  traced 
the  first  faint  lines  which  subsequent  speculation  was 
to  follow.    Edwards  and  Emerson  were  especially  influ- 
enced by  the  Stagirite,  and  the  later  theologians,  like 
the  earlier  Christian  fathers,  depended  upon  Hellenic 
speculation  to  reconcile  the  Mosaic  account  of  creation 
with  the  growing  naturalistic  explanations.     Some  time 
before  the  appearance  of  Darwinism  men  like  President 
Hitchcock   and   Tayler   Lewis  and  Arnold   Guyot   did 
much  in  the  attempt  to  reconcile  Genesis  and  geology,  to 
show  the  harmony  between  the  revealed  and  the  rational. 
The  outburst  of  controversy  upon  the  appearance  of  the 
Origin  of  Species  in  1859  was,  therefore,  no  unexpected 
thing.    An  earlier  generation  had  been  storing  the  pow- 
der to  be  exploded  in  the  battles  of  the  '60s.    Here  the 
scientists  were  the  chief  sappers,  and  ran  long  galleries 
of  anticipated  objections.    So  when  the  theory  of  natural 
selection  had  gained  its  adherents,  the  supornaturalists 
were  ready  for  them.    The  battle  was  extended  and  furi- 
ous.    Southward  from  Harvard  to  William  and  ^lary 
College,  westward  from  New  York  to  St.  Louis,  there 
was   a    continuous   campaign   of   scientific   controversy 
which  lasted  even  longer  than  the  civil  strife  which  rent 
the  country.    The  echoes  of  that  conflict  still  reverberate, 
and  in  the  remoter  fortresses  of  tradition  like  the  Prcs- 
byteri'an  Review  and  the  Bihliofhrca  Sacra  the  garrisons 
have  not  yet  pulled  down  the  flag.     In  brief,  from  the 
day  of  Puritanism  to  the  day  of  pragmatism  there  have 
been  so  manv  skirmishes,  battles,  and  general  engage- 


n. 


174  EVOLUTIONISM 

ments  as  almost  to  merit  the  name  of  the  warfare  be- 
tween evolution  and  revelation  in  America. 

In  the  history  of  this  warfare  there  are  two  main 
periods.  Adopting  the  distinction  of  Lord  Bacon,  the 
period  before  1859  may  be  called  that  of  anticipation; 
after  that  crucial  date,  that  of  interpretation.  In  the 
first  men  sought  for  evidences  of  design,  and  design  was 
an  assumed  general  principle,  and  facts  were,  in  large 
measure,  made  to  fit  the  theory.  In  the  second  period 
induction  was  increasingly  used;  facts  were  sought  for 
their  own  sake,  and  theory,  or  the  framing  of  an  hy- 
pothesis out  of  the  bits  furnished  by  the  sciences,  was  a 
more  cautious  and  hesitating  procedure.  It  is  no  cause 
for  astonishment  that  an  inevitable  conflict  was  to  be 
expected.  Between  the  men  of  deduction  and  the  men 
of  induction  there  was  a  clash  of  temperaments  which 
was  bound  to  throw  out  sparks.  The  men  of  the  first 
period,  w^ho  followed  the  high  a  priori  road,  were  men  of 
imagination;  they  beheld  visions  of  cosmic  order  and 
divine  purpose.  The  men  of  the  second  period,  who 
kept  to  the  narrow  paths  of  careful  experimentation, 
were  not  particularly  interested  in  absolute  order  and 
supreme  purpose.  They  w^ere  empiricists,  not  tran- 
scendentalists,  and  gloried  as  much  in  the  humility  of 
their  tasks  as  their  opponents  did  in  the  grandeur  of 
their  speculations.  The  transcendentalists  and  super- 
naturalists  looked  with  scorn  upon  the  grubbers  after 
detail,  and  charged  them  with  not  seeing  the  beauty 
of  the  forest  for  the  study  of  the  trees.  The  empiricists 
and  naturalists,  in  turn,  felt  it  no  disparagement  that 
they  should  "  creep  by  timid  steps  and  slow,  on  plain 
experience  lay  foundation  low." 

Let  us  take  up  the  first  period,  that  of  deduction,  of 
pure  speculation,  of  high  imagination.     From  Edwards 


THE  FORERUNNERS  OF  EVOLUTIONISM      175 

to  Emerson  there  is  a  line  of  Platonizers  who  looked_ 
at  the  natural  through  the  bright  lens  of  the  super- 
natural ;  who  could  meet  with  never  a  fact  without  gloss- 
ing   it    in    the    colors    of    eternity.      These    were    the 
"  analogy-loving  souls  "  \^-ho^w  a  double  meaning  in 
all  events.    When  the  Puritan  divTflc''*  viewM  the  moon 
for  continuance  "  it  was  the  glory  of  the  Lord  shining 
before  him;  when  the  Concord  sage  crossed  "  a  bare 
common  in  snow  puddles  at  twilight  under  a  clouded 
sky  "  it  was  to  enjoy  a  perfect  exhilaration.    This  poetic 
spirit  of  interpretation  impregnated  the  New  England 
mind  for  two  hundred  years.     Besides  the  masters  we 
find  it  in  Cotton  Mather's  Christian  Philosopher,   in 
Charles   Chauncy   and  his  Benevolence   of  the   Deity; 
and   in   the   Alvord   professorship   at   Harvard,    whose 
avowed  purpose  was  to  show  the  coincidence  between 
the  doctrines  of  revelation  and  the  dictates  of  reason. 
Bred  in  the  bone,  this  Platonizing  instinct  came  out 
in  all  the  acts  of  life.    Its  holders  sought  to  hitch  their 
wagons  to  stars,  to  drive  them  according  to  divine  design. 
But  their  aims  were  so  high  that  as  men  they  became,  at 
times,  unpractical,  and  fell  an  easy  prey  to  those  who 
merely  followed  their  own  noses  and  were  guided  by 
common  sense.    It  might  be  shown  how  they  floundered 
in  the  seven  seas  of  new  facts  furnished  by  the  scientists, 
but  this  is  a  sight  upon  which  it  is  not  fair  to  dwell.    In 
the  change  from  a  pessimistic  theology  to  an  optimistic 
theodicy  we  can  sympathize  with  Qotton  Mather 's^n- 
thusiasm  over  the  "  nice  provisions~of  nature' in  the 
vegetable  race,"  based,  as  it  was.  in  the  plastic  capacities 
of  nature  as  governed  by  an  all-wise  agent.    This  belief, 
in  fact,  furnished  the  way  out  of  the  maze  of  dotf^rmin- 
isra.     Indeed  it  was  buta  &tep^  from_the  old  Puritanic 
faith  in  aTBftrary  interferences  to  the  deistic  conviction 


176  EVOLUTIONISM 

"that  God  docs  not  act  b;y-  interposition  continually  re- 

\peafed,  but  _bx_  concurring  in  an  established  course  of 
\  nature.'  It  was  this  distinction  between  interference 
\  and  concurrence  that  later  allowed  Asa  Gray  to  meet 
\  the  storm  of  opposition  raised  b'y  the  doctrine  of  natural 
\  selection.  By  utilizing  the  concourse  of  second  causes 
he  claime^'lITat  morphology  and  teleology — things  as 
they  were  formed  and  things  as  they  were  foreordained 
— were  to  be  harmonized,  since  the  doctrine  of  specific 
creation  was  to  give  way  to  the  larger  principle  of 
design. 

This  distinction  was  unfortunately  forgotten.  Gray 
complains  of  the  absurdity  of  associating  design  only 
with  miracle,  for  this  association  was  one  which  did  much 
to  hinder  the  acceptance  of  Darwinism.  At  this  point 
the  Harvard  botanist  might  well  have  appealed  to  those 
Dudleian  lecturers  who,  in  his  own  college,  had  been 
aiming  to  prove  that ' '  the  structure  and  constitution  of 
the  world  and  the  accurate  adjustment  of  its  various 
parts  prove  an  intelligent,  wise,  and  good  Cause."  But 
the  argument  for  design  became  confused  with  the  doc- 
trine of  special  creation,  and  the  latter  was  one  of  those 
presuppositions  which  hindered  the  acceptance  of  a 
naturalistic  view  of  evolution.  The  confusion  was  worse 
confounded  by  the  attempts  to  harmonize  Genesis  and 
geology.  In  this  the  American  exegetes  were  not  such 
literalists  as  the  English.  The  Hutchinsonian  school, 
which  held  that  the  Scriptures  contain  a  complete  sys- 
tem of  natural  philosophy,  had  little  vogue  in  the  land. 
Benjamin  Franklin,  for  example,  complained  that  such 
a  manner  of  philosophizing  was  much  out  of  his  way. 
But  the  psycho-theological  school  had  some  followers. 
As  early  as  1811  Thomas  Dobson  declared  that  the  geo- 
logical discoveries,  which  seem  to  indicate  a  much  longer 


THE  FORERUNNERS  OF  EVOLUTIONISM      177 

duration  of  the  earth  than  six  thousand  years,  are  not 
inconsistent  with  the  ^losaie  history  because  the  word 
creation  means  not  creating  out  of  nothing,  but  putting 
the  chaotic   world  with   its  furniture  in  the  beautiful 
order  in  which  it  is  arranged.     Again,  as  late  as  1852, 
we  find  in  President  Hitchcock's  Religion  and  Geology 
the  acceptance  of  the  theory  that  the  six  days  of  creation 
were   but  six   continuous   pictures  that   were   made  to 
pass  before  the  vision  of  Moses.    This  kinetoscopic  cos- 
mology has  its  absurd  side,  but  along  with  the  ludicrous 
there  was  a  certain  logical  framework  discoverable  in  the 
scheme.     It  had  these  three  factors:   special  creation, 
permanence  of  species,  cataclysmic  destruction.    In  other 
words,  that  which  the  Almighty  had  been  pleased  to 
create,  remained  fixed,  until  it  was  again  his  good  pleas- 
ure to  destroy.    As  if  after  the  analogy  of  man  who  was 
created  perfect,  then  fell,  and  was  lastly  punished  by 
death  as  the  universal  law,  so  each  organic  species  is 
created  by  special  dispensation  of  the  deity,  then  allowed 
to  develop  up  to  certain  limits,  and  finally  swept  away 
in  a  vast  catastrophe,  the  "  platforms  of  death  "  por- 
trayed by  Hugh  Miller  in  his  Footsteps  of  the  Creator. 
Now  this  scheme  of  supernaturalism  had,  as  its  counters- 
part,  the  scheme  of  naturalism  which  had  sprung  up  in 
the  century  preceding  Darwin.    Against  special  creation 
there  was  put  spontaneous  generation;  against  perma- 
nence  of  species,   mutability;    against   cataclysmic   de- 
struction, degradation  through  disuse.  ^^ 
To  trace  the  differences  between  these  two  schemes 
and  the  gradual  displacement  of  the  former  by  the  latter, 
is  to  trace  a  sort  of  philosophic  "  fault,"  a  metaphysical 
cleavage  which  occurs  where  the  pressure  is  greatest. 
The  last  of  these  factors  we  may  dispose  of  at  once  be- 
cause   it    destroyed    itself    by    its    very    exaggeration. 


178  EVOLUTIONISM 

Cataclysmic  destruction  was  a  sort  of  a  French  Revolu- 
tion in  nature,  a  transfer  of  political  disasters  to  the 
realm  of  the  different  natural  kingdoms.  As  one  of  its 
advocates  declared :  earth  has  its  tempests  as  well  as  the 
ocean ;  there  are  reserved  without  doubt  in  the  destinies 
of  nature  fearful  epochs  for  the  ravage  of  human  races, 
and  there  are  times  marked  on  the  divine  calendar  for 
the  ruin  of  empires  and  for  the  periodic  renewal  of  the 
mundane  features. 

We  return  to  the  first  factor,  the  first  point  of  pres- 
sure in  the  new  line  of  cleavage.  This  was  spontaneous 
generation.  Thatjueantbriefly  that  life  is  Inherent  in 
matter  and  under  certain  favorable  conditions  will 
bursTTdrth  into  active  being.  This  point  was  contro- 
verted by  the  cautious  Hitchcock,  who  declares  that  not 
many  years  since  the  equivocal  or  casual  production 
of  "  animalculi,"  without  any  other  parentage  than 
"  law,"  was  thought  to  be  made  out  by  a  multitude 
of  facts ;  but  now  the  advocates  of  this  ' '  law  ' '  hypoth- 
esis have  been  fairly  driven  from  this  stronghold  of 
their  argument.  This  theory,  he  continues,  was  first 
drawn  out  by  the  French  zoologists,  who  endeavored  to 
show  by  the  inherent  vitality  of  some  parts  of  matter, 
how  the  first  or  lowest  classes  of  animals  and  plants  may 
have  been  produced ;  and  how  from  these,  by  the  theory 
of  development  and  the  force  of  circumstances,  all  the 
higher  animals,  with  their  instincts  and  intellects,  may 
have  been  evolved. 

The  second  point  of  pressure  was  mutability,  or  the 
gradual  transmutation  of  spe£ies....inta„-oae  another 
througH  na_turai""caTr5e5."^his  doctrine  came  very  near 
being  reached  by  an  early  Princetonian.  In  his  notable 
Essay  on  the  Causes  of  the  Vanety  of  Complexion  and 
\Figurc  in  the  Human  Species,  Stanhope  Smith,  as  early 


THE  FORERUNNERS  OF  EVOLUTIONISM       179\ 

as  1787,  virtually  accepted  the  Lamarckian  prim-iplo  of 
the  origin  of  variations  from  the  factors  of  use  and  dis- 
use, food,  climate,  or  the  etfort  of  the  individual.     The 
varieties  of  human  nature,  he  contends,  are  to  he  ex- 
plained by  the  Imown  operations  of  natural  causes  and 
the  necessary  laws  of  the  material  world,  such  as  climate, 
the  state  of  society,  and  the  manner  of  living.    Partiott-^ 
lar  differences  are  small.    It  is  the  example  of  the  whole 
that  surprises  us  by  its  magnitude.    The  combined  effect 
of  many  minute  varieties,  like  the  product  arising  from 
the  multiplication  of  many  small  numbers,  appears  great 
and  unaccountable.    .    .    .    Human  nature  being  much 
more  pliant  than  animal,  and  affected  by  the  greater 
variety    of   causes    from   food,    clothing,    lodging,    and 
manners,  is  still  more  easily  susceptible  to  change,  ac- 
cording to  any  general  standard,  or  idea,  of  the  human 
form.     To  this  principle,  as  well  as  to  the  manner  of 
living,  it  may  be  in  great  part  attributed  that  the  Ger- 
mans, the  Swedes,  and  the  French,  in  different  parts  of 
the  United  States,  who  live  chiefly  among  themselves, 
and  cultivate  the  habits  and  ideas  of  the  countries  from 
which  they   emigrated,  retain,  even  in  our  climate,  a 
strong  resemblance  to  their  primitive  stock.     Those,  on 
the  other  hand,  who  have  not  confined  themselves  to  the 
contracted  circle  of  their  countrymen,  but  have  mingled 
freely   with   the   Anglo-Americans,   entered   into    their 
manners,  and  adopted  their  ideas,  have  assumed  such  a 
likeness  to  them,  that  it  is  not  easy  now  to  distinguish 
from  one  another  people  who  sprung  from  such  differont 
origins.   ...   So,  in  proportion  as  tlie  citizens  of  the 
States  approach  the  vicinity  of  the  Indian  tribes,  simi- 
larity of  situation  produces  also  a  great  approximation 
of  manners ;  they  decline  the  labors  of  agriculture  as  a 
toil  and  prefer  the  fatigues  of  hunting  to  all  other  pleas- 


180  EVOLUTIONISM 

ures,  and  the  charms  of  indolence  and  independence  to 
the  refinements  and  attractions  of  civil  society. 

In  Stanhope  Smith  there  was  a  certain  advance  over 
the  old  way  of  thinking :  the  old  held  that  species  were 
adapted  by  the  Creator,  the  new  that  they  were  created 
adaptable.  But  while  this  adaptability  is  a  step  toward 
a  naturalistic  view,  unfortunately  for  the  purely  scien- 
tific aspect  of  his  acute  observations  the  Princetonian 
gives  a  supernaturalistic  turn  to  his  arguments.  The 
flexibility  which  he  concedes  is  but  fractional  compared 
with  the  fixity  of  the  species;  it  is  only  a  principle  of 
pliancy  given  to  divinely  endowed  primitive  man,  in 
order  that  he  may  be  capable  of  accommodation  to  every 
situation  in  the  globe. 

As  an  early  American  ethnologist  Stanhope  Smith 
had  great  opportunities,  but  an  unfettered  doctrine  of 
mutability  was  impossible  because  of  his  prior  belief  in 
special  creation.  Hence  for  a  full  quarter  of  a  century 
the  doctrine  of  mutability  lay  undeveloped  in  native 
thought.  But  in  1813  William  Charles  Wells  wrote  a 
paper  on  the  Formation  of  Faces,  which  had  the  dis- 
tinction of  being  favorably  spoken  of  by  Charles  Dar- 
win in  his  Historical  Sketch  of  his  forerunners.  Refer- 
ring to  man's  selective  action  regarding  domesticated 
animals  Wells  gives  this  pregnant  passage:  "  But  what 
is  here  done  by  art  seems  to  be  done  with  equal  efficacy 
though  more  slowly  by  nature,  in  the  formation  of 
varieties  of  mankind  fitted  for  the  country  which  they 
inhabit."  The  paper  of  Wells  was  so  little  known  that 
Morton,  the  Philadelphia  craniologist,  could  declare  that 
nothing  was  done  in  ethnology  in  the  United  States  be- 
tween Stanhope  Smith  and  himself.  So  Morton  re- 
counts how,  at  the  commencement  of  his  study  in  1824, 
he  was  taught  that  all  mankind  were  derived  from  a 


THE  FORERUXNERS  OF  EVOLUTIONISM       181 

single  pair,  and  that  diversity,  now  so  remarkable,  origi- 
nated solely  from  the  operations  of  climate,  locality, 
food,  and  other  physical  agents.  Yet  Morton  is  satisfied 
with  neither  of  these  views — the  old  or  the  new — neither 
the  special  creation  of  the  literalist,  nor  the  mutability 
of  the  transformationist.  The  ordinary  exposition  of 
Genesis  is  declared  impossible :  that  all  human  races  are 
of  some  one  species  and  one  family  is  contradicted  by 
their  present  variations.  Again  that  all  mankind  were 
derived  from  a  single  pair,  and  that  the  diversities  now 
so  remarkable  originated  soleh'  from  physical  operations, 
would  demand  indefinite  periods, — those  chiliads  of 
years  which  Prichard  came  to  advocate.  ...  It  cannot 
be  that  chance,  alone,  has  caused  all  the  physical  dis- 
parity among  men  from  the  noblest  Caucasian  form  to 
the  most  degraded  Australian  and  Hottentot.  There- 
fore one  must  conclude  that  these  diversities  are  not 
acquired,  but  have  existed  ah  origine. 

In  attempting  to  avoid  the  difficulties  both  of  uniform 
creation  and  purely  natural  transmutation  Morton  takes 
a  mediating  view.  He  favors  a  doctrine  of  primeval 
diversities  among  men, — an  original  adaptation  of  the 
several  races  to  those  varied  circumstances  of  climate 
and  locality  which,  while  congenial  to  the  one,  are  de- 
structive to  the  other.  On  the  surface,  this  use  of  the 
word  adaptation  might  lead  to  the  inference  that  ^lor- 
ton  advocates  natural  selection.  Such  is  not  the  ease. 
His  adaptation  is  supernatural,  not  natural.  It  affirms 
that  diversity  among  animals  is  a  fact  determined  by 
the  will  of  the  Creator.  It  denies  the  competency  of 
physical  causes  to  produce  the  effect  alleged.  It  is, 
therefore,  not  to  be  interpreted  as  approaching  a  theory 
of  mutation.  It  may  be  pointed  out  how  close  were  these 
views  to  those  of  Agassiz.    In  fact  ^lorton's  definition 


EVOLUTIONISM 

pecies  as  primordial  forms,  prepared  the  way  for 
the  promulgation  of  the  kindred  theory  of  the  Swiss 
naturalist,  as  he  expressed  it  later  in  his  introduc- 
tion to  Morton's  own  Types  of  ManMnd.  Morton's 
views  were  spread  in  the  South  through  his  pupil, 
Knott  of  Mobile.  They  came  to  a  curious  use  at  the 
hands  of  the  politician,  John  C.  Calhoun,  who  argues 
that  if  all  men  had  a  common  origin,  whites  and  blacks 
would  be  equal ;  but  there  has  been  a  plurality  of  origins, 
and  one  of  these  primordial  varieties  was  the  negro,~wh(r" 
was  originally  created  the  inferior  of  the  Caucasian; 

.      therefore,  between  whites  and  blacks  there  is  no  real 

^- — equality. 

In  contrast  with  such  special  pleading  and  in  logical 
connection  with  the  paper  of  Wells,  are  the  conjectures 
of  Haldeman  and  Leidy  on  the  possibilities  of  natural 
variation.  It  was  the  former  who  declared :  Although  we 
may  not  be  able  artificially  to  produce  a  change  beyond 
a  given  point,  it  would  be  a  hasty  inference  to  suppose 
that  a  physical  agent,  acting  gradually  for  ages,  would 
not  carry  the  variation  a  step  or  two  farther,  so  that 
instead  of  the  original  (we  will  say)  four  vai'jeties,  they 
might  amount  to  six,  the  sixth  being  sufficielitl}^  unlike 
the  earlier  ones  to  induce  a  naturalist  to  consider  it 
distinct.  This  interesting  conjecture  was  published  in 
Boston  in  1843.  One  similar  to  it  appeared  in  Phila- 
delphia in  1850.  Joseph  Leidy,  the  paleontologist,  as- 
serted :  The  essential  conditions  of  life  are  five  in  num- 
ber, namely:  a  germ,  nutritive  matter,  air,  water,  heat, 
the  four  latter  undoubtedly  existing  in  the  interior  of 
all  animals.  The  result  is  that  very  slight  modifica- 
tions of  these  essential  conditions  of  life  are  sufficient 
to  produce  the  vast  variety  of  living  beings  upon  the 
globe. 


THE  FORERUNNERS  OF  EVOLUTIONISM      183 


There  are  none  so  blind  as  those  who  will  not  see. 
Here  were  two  fruitful  suggestions  which  lay  prac- 
tically forgotten  until  the  appearance  of  the  Origin  of 
Species.  This  neglect  was  calamitous,  yet  the  inability  to 
grasp  the  significance  of  these  naturalistic  arguments 
was  not  without  reason.  The  preformationists  were  iii — ^ 
the  majority  and  were  still  thinking  in  terms  of  the 
Platonic  archetypes.  There  still  lingered  in  their  mind 
the  Leibnizian  conception  of  a  great  chain  of  being 
which  binds  together  into  a  single  system  the  past  and 
present  epochs  of  organic  life.  This  doctrine  of  descent 
according  to  the  analogy  of  the  chain,  precluded  that 
of  growth  according  to  the  analogy  of  the  tree,  the  true 
tree  of  evolution  with  its  many  collateral  branches 
springing  from  some  single  internal  principle.  And  so 
until  the  appearance  of  Asa  Gray,  defender  of  Darwin. 
there  was  this  great  hindrance  to  the  doctrine  of  organic 
evolutionism, — a  preference  for  transcendence  over  im- 
manence. Just  as  the  Aristotelian  scale  of  being  had 
fallen  in  with  the  Puritanic  doctrine  of  predestination, 
so  no\\^^_jmaftg  the  doea<iiiilantsj3f  Puritans,  there  was  a 
difficulty  in  passing  from,  the  conception...of  special 
creaIIon_ofj£eci£S^.Jxed_b^^^^  to  that  o^he_continu 
ous  manifestation  of  the  dlviQe,actmtl£S  as  shown  in  an 
ordPfTyninfolding  of  the  universe.  In  fine,  tradition's  ^^^^^^ 
rigid  programme,  an  intellectualimposition  upon  matter  h 

of  what  should  evolve  from  it,  was  opposed  to  nature's  W 

having  any  part  in  initiating  variations,  in  originating  ^:  /^ 
novelties.    In  a  word,  the  fiat  of  the  Creator  is  set  over  ^i;<i* 

against   any   conception   of  creative   evolution,    in   the    V'- 
sense  of  the  self-sufficiency  of  the  universe,  and  this 
rendered   difficult  the  reception  of  Darwinism.     That 
reception  was  now  rendered  doubly  difficult  by  the  in- 
trusion of  a  foreign  force. 


:-^^ 


i 


> 


184  EVOLUTIONISM 

2.    The  Antagonism  of  Agassiz 

The  coming  of  Louis  Agassiz  in  1846  was  hailed  with 
delight  in  the  camp  of  the  preformationists  and  super- 
naturalists,  because  the  revival  of  Lamarck's  naturalism 
threatened  the  old  guard  with  defeat.  But  now  as  at 
Waterloo  help  came  from  the  East,  and  Agassiz,  like  an- 
other Bliicher,  turned  the  tide  of  battle.  The  reenforce- 
ment  consisted  in  the  Swiss  naturalist's  importation  of 
his  master's  views,  for  it  was  from  Cuvier  that  he  had 
derived  the  fixed  ideas  of  immutability  of  species, 
special  creation,  and  cataclysmic  destruction.  And  so 
because  he  brought  in  these  reenforcements  from  the 
flank  Agassiz  received  a  warm  welcome  at  the  hands  of 
the  reactionary  scientists  and  likewise  at  the  hands  of 
the  populace.  It  was  not  only  because  of  his  sanguine 
personality,  that,  to  use  his  own  phrase,  he  became  "  the 
spoilt  child  of  the  countrj^,"  but  because  his  convictions 
fell  in  with  those  of  an  essentially  conservative  democ- 
racy. Evolution  in  the  sense  of  physical  derivation  was 
identified  with  materialism,  and  materialism  to  the 
groundlings  meant  atheism.  To  all  this  Agassiz  fur- 
nished an  antidote.  Believing  that  the  order  in  the 
cosmos  depends  upon  intellectual  coherence,  not  ma- 
terial connections,  he  asked  if  the  divisions  of  the  animal 
kingdom  have  not  been  instituted  by  the  Divine  Intelli- 
gence as  the  categories  of  his  mode  of  thinking,  and,  if 
this  be  so,  whether  we  do  not  find  in  this  adaptability 
of  the  human  intellect  to  the  facts  of  creation  the  most 
conclusive  proof  of  an  affinity  with  the  Divine  Mind? 

That  which  was  put  as  a  query  became  so  fixed  a 
dogma  that  Agassiz  could  assure  a  committee  of  the 
Massachusetts  Legislature  visiting  his  museum,  that  in 
the  future  generations  there  would  not  be  a  child  who 


THE  ANTAGONISM  OF  AGASSIZ  185 

would  not  liave  the  opportunity  of  understanding  the 
scheme  of  creation  as  thoroughly  as  he  understood  his 
multiplication  table.  Now,  the  public  liked  such  an  as- 
sertion. It  pointed  out  aii  easy  road  to  learning.  It  also 
fell  in  with  their  views  of  a  benevolent  Providence,  who 
from  the  very  dawn  of  creation  saw  to  it  that  this  world 
should  be  arranged  for  the  benefit  of  man.  Thus  the 
tenets  of  intelligibility  and  benevolence  were  two  strings 
with  which  Agassiz  worked  the  public.  The  same  tenets 
were  not  without  influence  upon  the  conservative  sci- 
entists. These  he  utilized  in  that  famous  Essay  on 
Classification  in  his  widely  sold  Xatural  Ilhtonj  of  the 
United  States.  He  also  utilized  them  in  his  persistent 
attacks  on  Darwin.  In  his  review  of  the  Origin  of 
Species  he  repeats  his  favorite  formula  that  order  in  the 
organic  world  consists  in  intellectual  coherence,  not 
material  connection.  Otherwise  it  would  be  impossible 
to  show  that  branches  in  the  animal  kingdom  are  founded 
upon  different  plans  of  structure,  patterns  of  form, 
categories  of  thought  existing  in  the  divine  mind  and, 
therefore,  intelligently  and  methodically  combined  in 
all  parts. 

At  this  point  it  may  be  interesting  to  inquire  why  the 
arguments  presented  by  Darwin  in  favor  of  a  universal 
derivation  from  one  primary  form,  made,  as  Agassiz  con- 
fessed, not  the  slightest  impression  on  his  mind.  The 
reason  may  be  discovered  earlier  in  his  life  than  his 
biographers  suggest.  For  many  years  back,  he  declared, 
he  "lost  no  opportunity  of  urging  the  idea  that  while 
species  have  no  material  existence,  they  .  yet  exist  as 
categories  of  thought  in  the  mind  of  the  Creator.  Now 
what  is  the  ultimate  source  of  this  belief?  It  is  found 
in  Agassiz's  defense  of  his  old  teacher  Oken  and  tlie 
physio-philosophical   systems   based   on    Schelling.     So 


186  EVOLUTIONISM 

wlien  it  is  recalled  that  in  his  youth  Agassiz  listened  to 
Schclling  and  that  Schelling  was  a  Platonizer,  much  of 
the  type  of  Emerson,  one  can  understand  the  popularity 
of  such  views  when  they  were  freshly  imported  into 
America.  It  was  not  so  much  that  Emerson  knew  some- 
thing of  the  speculations  of  Schelling  and  Oken  from 
Coleridge,  but  that  he  was  a  constitutional  Platonizer 
who  believed  in  the  intelligibility  of  the  world  as  due  to 
the  essential  identity  of  the  operations  of  the  human 
and  divine  intellect.  This  transcendental  opinion  was 
one  of  the  medley  held  by  Agassiz.  From  it  he  inferred 
that  the  world  is  not  due  to  the  working  of  blind  forces, 
but  is  the  creation  of  a  reflective  mind  establishing  de- 
liberately all  the  categories  we  recognize  in  nature,  and 
combining  them  in  that  wonderful  harmony  which 
unites  all  things  into  such  a  perfect  system.  In  defense 
of  what  he  acknowledges  to  be  a  priori  conceptions  relat- 
ing to  nature,  Agassiz  falls  back  upon  One  Supreme 
Intelligence,  Author  of  all  things,  by  whose  almighty  fiat 
all  animals,  with  all  their  peculiarities,  were  created  upon 
the  general  plan  of  structure  of  the  great  type  to  which 
they  belong.  Here  the  Swiss  zoologist  talks  like  a  Platon- 
izing  Puritan.  He  goes  even  further  in  his  reaction 
against  naturalism.  As  to  the  origin  of  existing  animals 
and  plants  he  presents  for  consideration  three  theories: 
spontaneous  generation;  the  action  of  the  established 
laws  of  matter;  the  immediate  intervention  of  an  in- 
telligent Creator.  Of  these  three  Agassiz  boldly  advo- 
cates the  last  because  the  first  is  not  proven,  and  the 
second  would  stultify  his  postulate  and  preclude  design. 
Granted  that  the  four  different  plans  of  structure  ex- 
hibited in  the  animal  kingdom  illustrate  four  great 
primordial  ideas,  then,  unless  the  physical  agents  at 
work  in  the  early  days  of  the  existence  of  our  globe 


THE  ANTAGONISM  OF  AGASSIZ  187 

could  have  devised  such  plans,  and  impressed  them  upon 
the  material  world  as  the  pattern  upon  which  nature  was 
to  build  forever  afterwards,  no  such  general  relations 
as  exist  among  all  animals  could  ever  have  existed. 

In  his  recoil  from  naturalism  Agassiz  has  gone  to  such 
an  extreme  of  supernaturalism  as  to  have  lost  those 
very  arguments  for  design  in  the  constituted  laws  of  na- 
ture, so  skillfully  employed  by  the  deists.  At  the  hands 
of  such  a  reactionary  the  earlier  arguments,  therefore, 
fall  to  the  ground.  Intelligibility  and  intervention  are 
mutually  exclusive.  One  makes  the  world  comprehen- 
sible, the  other  incomprehensible.  "When  the  rational 
conceptions  fail,  it  is  necessary  to  call  in  the  help  of  the 
deity.  The  argument  is  again  put  in  the  form  of  a 
querj^ :  There  are  certain  extraordinary  changes  which 
one  and  the  same  animal  may  undergo  during  different 
periods  of  its  life; — does  not  this  prove  directly  the 
immediate  intervention  of  a  power  capable  of  control- 
ling all  these  external  conditions,  as  well  as  regulating 
the  course  of  life  of  every  being?  To  attack  such  a  posi- 
tion those  who  would  deny  the  intervention  in  nature  of 
a  creative  mind  must  show  that  the  cause  to  which  they 
refer  the  origin  of  finite  beings  is  by  its  nature  a  pos- 
sible cause,  which  cannot  be  denied  of  a  being  endowed 
with  the  attributes  which  we  recognize  in  God. 

With  such  an  outward  creed  Agassiz  came  into  a 
country  where  the  deists  had  won  the  day  in  behalf  of 
the  rationality  of  the  constituted  laws  of  nature.  It  is 
little  wonder  that,  when  the  master  repudiated  his 
primary  principles,  his  followers  should  go  over  to  the 
new  views.  This  explains  why  Agassiz 's  pupils  sur- 
rendered in  a  body  to  Darwinism.  In  the  first  place,  thoy 
found  their  leader's  immutable  classifications  constantly 
changing;  then  they  discovered  that  he  did  not  under- 


188  EVOLUTIONISM 

stand  the  bearing  of  his  own  laws ;  and  lastly  they  found 
that  these  laws  fitted  into  the  new  scheme  better  than 
into  the  old.  Agassiz's  great  idea  of  the  identity  of 
the  three  series — structural,  individual,  racial — really 
favored  naturalism  at  the  expense  of  supernaturalism. 
To  neglect  second  causes  and  refer  organic  changes  di- 
rectly to  a  first  cause— the  plans  of  the  Creator— made 
this  triple  identity  unnatural,  unreasonable,  dependent 
on  the  mere  whim  of  the  Almighty.  It  was  an  impossible 
position  that  Agassiz  took  that,  since  species  exist  as 
thoughts,  and  individuals  as  facts,  there  was  no  material 
connection  between  the  latter.  To  base  common  descent 
on  formal  grounds  and  at  the  same  time  to  exclude  a 
physical  differentiation  of  the  objects  themselves,  was 
merely  to  make  a  plan  of  a  picture  and  never  to  use  the 
actual  pigments.  Indeed  Agassiz  seemed  incapable  of 
filling  in  the  figures,  of  blending  the  whole  into  a  con- 
tinuous canvas.  He  postulates  his  four  plans  of  struc- 
ture, but  denies  that  they  are  transmutable  the  one  into 
the  other.  In  a  word,  his  was  a  static,  not  a  dynamic 
conception;  his  cosmos  a  prearranged  programme,  not 
a  spontaneous  growth.  So  he  inveighs  against  natural 
selection  as  a  misnomer,  since  selection  implies  design 
and  the  powers  to  which  Darwin  refers  the  orders  of 
species  can  design  nothing. 

It  was  this  insistence  on  the  ancient  form  of  the  argu- 
ment for  design  that  enabled  Asa  Gray  to  turn  some  of 
Agassiz's  own  guns  against  him.  Those  natural  divisions 
which  to  the  latter  existed  only  as  categories  of  thought 
in  the  supreme  intelligence,  and  were  of  an  independent 
existence  and  unvarying  as  thought  itself.  Gray  put  into 
the  ordering  processes  of  the  universe.  In  other  words, 
that  which  had  been  a  static,  transcendent  postulate  now 
becomes  a  dynamic,  immanent  principle.    To  Gray  this 


THE  ANTAGONISM  OF  AGASSIZ  189 

was  not  the  exclusion  of  the  superaatural,  but  its  inclu- 
sion in  the  natural.  No  longer  do  species  endure  in  a 
subjective  and  ideal  sense,  but  they  are  interrelated  by 
an  objective  inheritance  from  a  common  stock.  In  short, 
the  adamantine  chain  of  foreordination  is  replaced  by 
the  living  tree  of  genetic  descent.  In  this  way  the  ma- 
terial, against  which  Agassiz  inveighed,  is  turned  inside 
out  and  shown  to  be  interwoven  with  purpose.  Thus 
Gray  criticises  Agassiz 's  review  of  Darwin  and  contends 
that  the  Origin  of  Species  is  not  atheistic,  since  a  ma- 
terial connection  between  the  members  of  a  series  of 
organized  beings  is  not  inconsistent  with  the  idea  of  their 
being  intellectually  connected  with  one  another  through 
the  deity.  Agassiz  is  theistic  to  excess  because  the 
Creator  is  put  so  supremely  above  his  creation.  The  way 
out  of  the  apparent  difficulty  of  lack  of  design  is,  there- 
fore, to  regard  the  intenamtion  of  the  deity  "  not  so 
much  as  done  for  all  time,  as  doing  through  all  time." 

Whether  such  an  interpretation  was  a  proper  imma- 
nent theism,  or  a  perilous  approach  to  pantheism,  may 
be  judged  better  when  we  take  up  other  of  Danvin's 
reviewers.  Meanwhile  it  remains  to  be  shown  how  the 
appearance  of  the  Origin  of  Species,  instead  of  modify- 
ing Agassiz 's  beliefs,  tended  to  fix  them.  A  favorite 
disciple  acknowledged  that  it  was  a  special  characteristic 
of  Agassiz 's  mind,  intensified  by  the  teaching  of  his 
great  master  Cuvier,  seldom  to  acknowledge  an  error, 
but,  on  the  contrary,  to  try  by  all  means  to  maintain  his 
position.  That  characteristic  now  became  prominont. 
At  the  meetings  of  the  American  Acadomy  of  Science  and 
of  the  Natural  History  Society  of  Boston  in  1860.  he 
raised  the  sharpest  objections  against  the  acceptance  of 
Darwin's  theorv',  which  he  considered  a  "  mania  to  be 
outlived."    This  was  before  the  scientists.     Before  the 


190  EVOLUTIONISM 

public  he  again  brought  his  views  in  his  Methods  of  Study 
in  Natural  Uistory,  declaring  that  there  was  a  repulsive 
poverty  in  this  material  explanation  that  is  contradicted 
by  the  intellectual  grandeur  of  the  universe.  Finally,  in 
a  posthumous  article  appearing  in  the  Atlantic  Monthly, 
he  left  a  scientific  last  will  and  testament  in  which  he 
reiterated  the  convictions  which  he  had  brought  into  the 
country.  In  this  document  there  are  three  salient  sec- 
tions :  First,  that  the  law  of  evolution  keeps  types  within 
appointed  cycles  of  growth  which  revolve  forever  upon 
themselves;  second,  that  the  argument  of  Darwin  is 
purely  negative,  resting  upon  the  assumption  that  transi- 
tion types  have  dropped  out  from  the  geological  record ; 
and  lastly,  that  Darwinians  are  reluctant  to  grant  inter- 
vention of  an  intellectual  power  in  the  diversity  which 
obtains  in  nature,  under  the  plea  that  such  an  admission 
implies  distinct  creative  acts  for  every  species. 

In  the  first  of  these  tenets  Agassiz  goes  back  to  the 
nature-philosophy  of  his  youth,  takes  evolution  in  the 
literal  sense  of  an  unrolling  of  an  absolute,  and  sug- 
gests, if  he  does  not  borrow,  the  cyclic  processes  of  Vico. 
This  is  historically  consistent,  for  the  doctrine  of  a  recur- 
ring cosmic  process  has  often  been  bound  up  "with  the 
scheme  of  preformation.  That  the  argument  of  Darwin 
is  negative  is  not  so  well  taken.  Agassiz  indeed  insisted 
on  the  interrelations  of  the  three  series — structural,  em- 
bryonic, geologic — for  the  sake  of  the  light  that  each 
sheds  on  the  other.  Now,  the  first  of  these  series  presumes 
the  existence  of  the  third,  for  embryonic  growth  was  a 
positive  suggestion  that  the  geologic  succession  w^as  not 
discontinuous,  and  this  Agassiz 's  immediate  successors 
discovered.  In  the  last  objection  there  was  more  weight. 
The  young  and  ardent  spirits  of  the  day  were  reluctant 
to  grant  intervention,  as  it  seemed  to  carry  the  doctrine 


THE  RECEPTION  OF  DARWINISM  191 

of  design  to  an  extreme.  Tluis  Agassiz's  colleague,  Asa 
Gray,  reported  the  Lowell  Lectures  as  being  planned 
upon  high  ground  and  yet  with  a  certain  animus  against 
Lamarck  and  the  Vestiges.  Likewise  Agassiz's  pupil, 
Joseph  Le  Conte,  interpreted  the  master's  writings  as 
aimed  to  uphold  a  designed  development,  and  yet  one  not 
by  organic  forces  within,  but  according  to  an  intelligent 
plan  without, — an  evolution  not  by  transmutation  of 
species,  but  by  substitution  of  one  species  by  another. 

We  leave  Agassiz  with  his  last  will  and  testament. — 
a  stumbling-block  in  the  path  of  philosophical  progress. 
We  turn  to  his  colleague  and  counterpart,  Asa  Gray,  who 
did  more  than  any  single  native  writer  to  hasten  the  re- 
ception of  Darwinism. 

3.   The  Reception  of  Darwinism 

In  Asa  Gray  we  have  the  New  World's  most  efficient 
defender  of  Darwinism  after  the  appearance  of  the 
Origiii  of  Species  in  1859.  The  Harvard  botanist  con- 
fesses himself  a  convinced  theist  with  no  prepossession  in 
favor  of  naturalistic  theories.  Nevertheless  he  says  that 
within  half  a  generation  it  can  be  affirmed  that  the  gen- 
eral doctrine  of  the  derivation  of  species  has  prevailed 
over  that  of  specific  creation,  and  this  in  spite  of  the 
fact  that  so  many  of  the  reviewers  attack  the  Origin  as 
pantheistic,  if  not  atheistic.  In  his  first  review  of 
March,  1860,  he  writes  that  "  this  book  is  exciting  much 
attention  "and  that  already  two  American  editions  are 
announced.  He  foresees  a  spirited  conflict  among  opin- 
ions of  every  grade,— a  struggle  for  existence  in  which 
natural  selection  itself  will  destroy  tho  weaker  and  allow 
the  stronger  to  survive.  Such  conflicting  opinions  are 
those  of  Dana  of  Yale,  whose  idealistic  Thoughts  upon 


192  EVOLUTIONISM 

Species  will  not  readily  harmonize  with  the  naturalistic 
scheme,  and  those  of  Agassiz,  who  widely  diverges  from 
Darwinism. 

Gray  now  draws  an  instructive  parallel  between  the 
views  of  the  Swiss- American  and  those  of  the  English- 
man in  order  to  bring  out  the  main  features  of  the  theory 
of  the  origination  of  species  by  means  of  natural  selec- 
tion. While  Agassiz  discards  the  idea  of  common  de- 
scent as  the  real  bond  of  union  among  the  individuals 
and  holds  that  each  species  originated  at  the  same  time 
over  the  whole  geographical  area  it  occupies,  Darwin 
holds  the  orthodox  view  of  the  descent  of  all  the  indi- 
viduals of  a  species  not  only  from  a  local  birthplace,  but 
from  a  single  ancestor  or  pair.  He  adds  that  each  species 
has  extended  and  established  itself,  through  natural 
agencies,  wherever  it  could ;  so  that  the  actual  geo- 
graphical distribution  of  any  species  is  by  no  means  a 
primordial  arrangement,  but  a  natural  result. 

By  the  "  orthodox  "  rule  of  descent.  Gray  evidently 
meant  the  Bible  view,  since  the  theory  of  a  plurality  of 
centers  of  origin  lent  itself  to  the  common  American  be- 
lief in  the  possibility  of  special  creation  in  order  to 
repair  the  ravages  of  cataclysms.  If,  now,  we  substitute 
for  the  word  orthodox  the  word  current,  we  see  that 
Agassiz  had  the  people  on  his  side.  His  theory,  con- 
tinues Gray,  referring  the  phenomena  both  of  origin 
and  distribution  directly  to  the  divine  will,  both  being 
equally  primordial,  equally  supernatural,  and  also  up- 
holding that  every  adaptation  of  species  to  climate  and 
of  species  to  species,  is  as  aboriginal  and,  therefore,  inex- 
plicable as  are  the  organic  forms  themselves, — this  theory- 
is  theistic  to  excess.  The  opposite  theory  is  not  open 
to  this  objection.  The  question  of  primordial  origin  may 
be  left  in  abeyance,  but  geographical  distribution  is  not 


THE  RECEPTION  OF  DARWINISM  193 

a  primordial  arrangement  but  a  natural  result.  More- 
over, adaptation  is  a  phenomenon  aecordin.ir  to  which 
plants  and  animals  are  subject  from  their  birth  to  phys- 
ical influences,  to  which  they  have  to  accommodate  them- 
selves as  they  can.  Is  it  not  possible  to  harmonize  these 
two  theories,  if  the  former  makes  the  unity  of  plan  only 
intellectual,  and  the  latter  makes  inheritance  material? 
In  other  words,  is  it  not  most  presumable  that  an  intel- 
lectual conception  realized  in  nature  would  be  realized 
through  physical  agencies?  To  Gray  the  compromise 
between  theological  views  and  physical  causation  seems 
not  impossible.  When  Agassiz  refers  the  whole  to  the 
agency  of  intellect  as  its  first  cause  and  when  Darwin 
does  not  deny  an  intellectual  connection  between  species 
— as  related  to  a  supreme  intelligence — Gray  dimly  ap- 
prehends a  probable  combination  of  these  divergent 
theories,  and  in  that  combination  the  ground  for  a  strong 
stand  against  "  mere  naturalism." 

In  this  last  phrase  the  compromiser  is  really  not  one- 
sided. The  proof  that  he  does  not  take  a  stand  against 
the  natural  is  that  he  is  opposed  to  the  exclusively  super- 
natural. Thus  he  adds  that  substantive  proof  of  specific 
creation  is  not  attainable,  but  that  of  derivation  or  trans- 
mutation of  species  may  be.  The  propounders  of  the 
latter  view  are  bound  to  do  one  of  two  things :  either  to 
assign  real  and  adequate  causes,  the  natural  or  necessarA- 
result  of  which  must  be  to  produce  the  present  diversity 
of  species  and  their  actual  relations;  or,  to  show  the 
general  conformity  of  the  whole  body  of  facts  to  such 
assumption  through  its  competency  to  harmonize  all  the 
facts.  Lamarck  mainly  undertook  the  first  line,  but  his 
doctrine  of  appetencies  and  habits  of  animals  reacting 
upon  their  structure  met  with  a  somewhat  undeserved 
ridicule.     The  shadowy  author  of  the  Vestiges  of  the 


194  EVOLUTIONISM 

Natural  History  of  Creation  can  hardly  be  said  to  have 
undertaken  either  line,  in  a  scientific  way.  He  would 
explain  the  whole  progressive  evolution  of  nature  by 
virtue  of  an  inherent  tendency  to  develop,  thus  giving 
us  an  idea  or  a  word  in  place  of  a  natural  cause,  a 
restatement  of  the  proposition  instead  of  an  explana- 
tion. Darwin  attempts  both  lines  of  proof  and  in  a 
strictly  scientific  spirit. 

Nothing  could  have  been  more  fortunate  than  this 
presentation  of  the  case.  It  disarmed  criticism  of  the 
naturalistic  hypothesis  by  throwing  the  burden  of  proof 
upon  the  propounder.  It  allowed  for  a  sufficient  margin 
of  deistie  interpretation  to  satisfy  the  supernaturalists. 
Darwin,  in  proposing  a  theory  which  suggests  a  method 
that  harmonizes  these  facts,  into  a  system  we  may  trust, 
implies  that  all  was  done  wisely,  in  the  largest  sense 
designedly,  and  by  an  intelligent  First  Cause.  Gray 
expressed  trust  in  Darwin's  deistie  drift  through  the  lat- 
ter's  allowing  Paley 's  argument  a  further  extension,  and 
through  his  changing  the  meaning  of  the  intervention  of 
the  Creator  as  done  for  all  time,  to  an  intervention  as 
doing  through  all  time. 

It  is  possible  that  Gray  strains  a  point  in  trying  to  ac- 
commodate Darwinism  to  the  traditional  Anglo-American 
philosophy.  Yet  he  makes  full  allowance  for  the  diffi- 
culties in  the  way  of  the  acceptance  of  the  new  theory. 
The  first  difficulty  is  the  imperfection  of  the  geological 
records.  Of  the  records  of  fossil  lithography  all  but  the 
last  volume  is  out  of  print,  and  of  its  pages  only  local 
glimpses  have  been  obtained.  But, for  these  gaps,  we 
need  not  ''  invoke  cataclysm  to  involve  the  world,"  for 
the  theory  of  uniformity  will  account  for  all  geological 
changes  in  a  quiet  and  easy  way.  The  second  difficulty 
is  that  of  the  "  missing  link."    Wide  is  the  gap  between 


THE  RECEPTION  OF  DARWINISM  195 

the  highest  quadnimana  and  man  ;  but  where  is  there  the 
slightest  evidence  of  a  common  progenitor?  In  evolution 
the  prospect  of  the  future  is  encouraging ;  but  the  back- 
ward glance  alarming.  There  may  be  a  closer  associa- 
tion of  our  ancestors  of  the  olden  time  with  "  our  poor 
relations  "  of  the  quadnimanous  family  than  we  like  to 
acknowledge.  But  the  whole  argument  in  natural  theol- 
ogj'-  for  a  final  cause,  say  in  the  structure  of  the  hand,  is 
just  as  good  on  the  supposition  of  the  descent  of  men 
from  chimpanzees  and  gorillas  as  it  would  have  been  in 
the  case  of  the  first  man  supernaturally  created.  Mean- 
while intermediate  links  between  the  two-handed  and  the 
four-handed  are  lacking  altogether,  so  we  must  needs 
believe  in  the  separate  and  special  creation  of  man. 

A  third  difficulty  is  that  of  sterility.  Danvin  labors 
to  show  that  sterility  is  not  a  special  endowment,  to  pre- 
vent the  confusion  of  species  by  mingling,  but  an  inci- 
dental acquirement.  But  this  arrangement  to  keep  apart 
those  forms  which  have,  or  have  acquired,  a  certain 
moderate  amount  of  difference,  looks  to  us  as  much 
designed  for  the  purpose  as  does  a  ratchet  to  prevent 
reverse  motion  in  a  wheel.  A  fourth  and  a  most  formi- 
dable difficulty  is  that  of  the  production  and  specializa- 
tion of  organs.  All  organic  beings  have  been  formed  on 
two  great  laws:  unity  of  type,  and  adaptation  to  the 
conditions  of  existence.  The  special  teleolngists,  such 
as  Paley,  occupy  themselves  with  the  latter  only,  refer- 
ring particular  facts  to  special  design,  but  leaving  an 
overwhelming  array  of  the  widest  facts  inexplicable.  The 
morphologists  build  on  unity  of  type,  which  requires 
each  individual  "to  go  through  a  certain  formality." 
and  to  accept,  at  least  for  a  time,  certain  organs,  whether 
they  are  of  any  use  to  him  or  not.  If  philosophers  seek 
to  harmonize  these  two  views  theoretically,  Darwin  har- 


196  EVOLUTIONISM 

raonizes  them  naturally:  adaptation  is  the  result  of 
natural  selection;  unity  of  type,  of  unity  of  reason. 

In  this  summary  statement  Gray  has  given  due  weight 
to  both  sides  of  the  controversy.  He  confessed  that  at 
first  he  had  no  prepossession  in  favor  of  naturalistic 
theories  and  that  the  evidence  presented  by  Darwin  had 
been  so  strong  that  he  could  not  but  give  his  studies  the 
name  of  Darwiniana. 

In  turning  from  the  college  at  Cambridge  to  the  col- 
lege at  New  Haven  we  find  an  illustration  of  the  sarcastic 
saying  that  where  Harvard  leads  Yale  follows — at  a  dis- 
tance. In  James  Dwight  Dana,  the  geologist,  we  have 
a  preformationist  who  through  his  unifonnitarian  views 
came  to  a  gradual  but  grudging  acknowledgment  of 
Darwinism.  As  early  as  1848  Dana  writes  to  Gray  that 
the  view  which  he  had  favored  of  late  was  one  suggested 
by  Professor  Henry  of  Washington,  who  considered  the 
forces  in  animate  nature  chemical  forces,  but  also  that 
there  was  a  directrix  behind  all,  modifying  or  govern- 
ing the  results.  He  compared  it  to  a  steam  engine  whose 
forces  within  were  directed  in  their  operation  by  the 
engineer.  Here  was  a  sort  of  deistic  dynamism,  the  raw 
material  which  Dana  worked  over  for  thirty  years  and 
left  in  this  finished  law  of  development:  *'  Unity  evolv- 
ing multiplicity  of  parts,  to  successive  individualization, 
proceeding  from  the  more  fundamental  onwards." 

The  first  modification  of  this  suggested  transcendent 
dynamism  was  to  make  it  partially  immanent.  In  his 
idea  of  species  as  certain  amounts  or  kinds  of  concen- 
trated force,  Gray  told  Dana  that  he  fell  back  upon  the 
broadest  and  most  fundamental  views,  and  developed 
them  with  great  ability  and  cogency.  The  praise  is 
just.  Dana's  Thoughts  on  Species  is  a  clearly  reasoned 
study  of  the  comprehensive  principles  that  pervade  the 


THE  RECEPTION  OF  DARWINISM  197 

universe,  with  the  purpose  of  finding  out  the  meaning 
of  permanency,  and  the  basis  of  variations  in  species. 
In  this  study  of  1857  the  author  hopes  to  illumine  a 
subject  as  yet  involved  in  doubts  and  diflficulties,  by 
reasoning  from  central  principles  to  circumferential. 
From  the  study  of  the  inorganic  world  we  learn  that 
each  element  is  represented  by  a  specific  amount  or  law 
of  force.  The  essential  idea  of  species  thus  deduced  is 
this:  a  species  corresponds  to  a  specific  amount  or  con- 
dition of  force,  defined  in  the  act  or  law  of  creation.  But 
in  organic  beings,  unlike  the  inorganic,  there  is  a  cycle 
of  progress  involving  growth  and  decline.  The  oxygen 
molecule  may  be  eternal  as  far  as  anything  in  its  nature 
goes.  But  the  germ-cell  is  but  an  incipient  stage  in  a 
cycle  of  changes,  and  is  not  the  same  for  two  successive 
instants.  Thus  an  indefinite  perpetuation  of  the  germ-cell 
is  in  fact  effected ;  yet  it  is  not  mere  endless  being,  but 
like  evolving  like  in  an  unlimited  round.  Hence  when 
individuals  multiply  from  generation  to  generation,  it 
is  but  a  repetition  of  the  primordial  type-idea,  and  the 
true  notion  of  species  is  not  in  the  resulting  group,  but 
in  the  idea  or  potential  element  which  is  at  the  basis 
of  every  individual  of  the  group. 

In  Dana's  elaborate  series  of  definitions  we  have  sev- 
eral points  of  attachment  with  his  fellow-scientists. 
The  cyclic  conception  is  that  of  Agassiz,  while  the  defini- 
tion of  the  primordial  type-idea  is  acknowledged  to  be 
nearly  the  same  as  that  of  ^Morton,  when  he  described  a 
species  as  a  primordial  organic  force.  But  there  is  yet 
a  difference.  "With  Dana  there  is  greater  emphasis  upon 
the  immanent  element  in  the  evolutionary  process.  Each 
species,  he  continues,  has  its  own  special  mode  of  de- 
velopraont  as  well  as  ultimate  form  or  result, — its  serial 
unfolding,  inworking,  and  outflowing.    The  precise  na- 


198  EVOLUTIONISM 

lure  ol'  {he  potentiality  in  each  species  is  expressed  by 
tlie  line  of  historical  progress  from  the  germ  to  the  full 
expansion  of  its  power.  We  comprehend  the  type-idea 
only  when  we  understand  the  cycle  of  evolution  through 
all  its  laws  of  progress,  both  as  regards  the  living  struc- 
ture under  development  within,  and  its  successive  rela- 
tions to  the  external  world. 

Thus  far  there  is  much  that  is  significant  in  Dana's 
essay.  It  has  an  air  of  novelty.  In  its  reference  to  the 
influence  of  the  external  world  it  appears  to  lean  to- 
ward the  environmental  influences  of  Darwin.  Mean- 
while the  Origin  of  Species  had  appeared  and  the  doe- 
trine  of  variation  through  natural  selection  was  rife. 
But  as  Dana  wrote  to  Darwin  in  1863,  geology  has  not 
afforded  facts  that  sustain  the  view  that  the  system  of 
life  has  been  evolved  through  a  method  of  development 
from  species  to  species.  Darwin,  in  turn,  admits  that 
his  correspondent's  objections  are  perfectly  valid,  but  he 
adds  this  demurrer :  "  As  my  book  has  been  lately  some- 
how attended  to,  perhaps  it  would  have  been  better  if, 
when  you  condemned  all  such  views,  you  had  stated  that 
you  had  not  been  able  yet  to  read  it.  But  pray  do  not 
suppose  that  I  think  for  one  instant  that,  with  your 
strong  and  slowly  acquired  convictions  and  immense 
knowledge,  you  could  have  been  converted.  The  utmost 
that  I  could  have  hoped  would  have  been  that  you  might 
possibly  have  been  here  or  there  staggered.  Indeed,  I 
should  not  much  value  any  sudden  conversion,  for  I  re- 
member well  how  many  years  I  fought  against  my  pres- 
ent belief." 

The  conversion  of  Dana  to  Darwinism — if  such  it  may 
be  called — was  indeed  slow.  A  dozen  years  after  this 
letter  he  insists  that  the  transition  between  species,  in 
the  system  of  progress,  has  not  yet  proved  to  be  gradual 


THE  RECEPTION  OF  DARWINISM  199 

and  that  man  is  not  of  nature's  making,  but  owes  his 
existence  to  the  special  act  of  the  Infinite  Beinpr  whose 
image  he  beai*s.  But  the  tide  at  last  turned,  and.  twenty 
years  later,  naturalism  and  supernaturalism  came  to  a 
compromise  in  his  mind.  As  he  wrote  in  the  last  and 
revised  edition  of  his  Manual  of  Geologif,  the  former 
speculative  conclusions  are  not  all  in  accord  with  the 
author's  present  judgment.  In  giving  up  the  general 
principles  with  regard  to  the  progress  in  the  earth's 
life — such  as  progress  from  the  aquatic  to  the  terrestrial, 
from  the  simple  to  the  complex — he  states  that  all  these 
principles  are  in  accord  with  a  theory  of  evolution,  and, 
through  the  added  facts  of  later  years,  they  favor  the 
view  of  evolution  by  natural  variation.  Such  added 
facts  are  that  Arctic  America  contained  in  tertiary-  time 
plants  so  much  like  species  existing  in  the  forests  of  both 
temperate  North  America  and  Japan,  that  the  former 
have  been  pronounced  the  undoubted  progenitors  of  the 
latter.  Also  along  the  Pacific  Coast  and  Gulf  Coast  of 
Central  America  there  are  so  many  identical  and  nearly 
related  species  of  aquatic  animals  that  migration  during 
a  time  of  submergence  of  the  narrow  strip  of  land,  with 
subsequent  variation,  is  regarded  as  the  only  reason- 
able explanation. 

Dana's  old  preformationism  with  its  fixed  types  now 
gives  place  to  great  plasticity  in  organic  structures  under 
variant  agencies.  A  telling  proof  here  is  a  fossil  collec- 
tion of  Dana's  pupil.  Marsh,  exhibiting  the  descent  of  the 
horse  from  the  primitive  five-toed  species  to  the  present 
one-toed  variety.  This  collection  was  a  palpable  proof 
to  Huxley,  yet  Dana  was  never  entirely  won  over  to 
naturalism.  The  causes  of  variation  mentioned  by  Dar- 
win are  acknowledged  to  be  real  causes,  but  they  are 
held  to  act  directlv,  after  the  Lamarckian  method,  with- 


•200  EVOLUTIONISM 

out  dependence  for  success  upon  the  principle  of  natural 
selection.  This  theory  is  not  essential  to  evolution  be- 
cause it  is  based  on  the  assumption  that  variations  come 
singly  or  nearly  so,  and  that  the  selected  are,  therefore, 
few  compared  with  the  multitudes  that  disappear.  The 
idea  is  derived  from  facts  recorded  of  domestic  or  culti- 
vated races  whose  structures  are  in  a  strained  or  artificial 
state  and  deteriorate  when  care  ceases.  But  in  wild  na- 
ture variations  are,  in  general,  the  slow  and  sure  results 
of  the  conditions.  When,  therefore,  a  variation  appears 
that  admits  of  augmentation  by  continued  inbreeding, 
progress  should  be  general,  and  the  unadaptable  few 
.should  disappear,  not  the  multitude.  Man  affords  an  ex- 
ample. The  gradual  gain  of  some  races  in  lands  and 
supremacy  and  the  disappearance  of  the  inferior  races  is 
one  example  of  the  survival  of  the  fittest,  or  natural  selec- 
tion. But  the  superior  races  derived  the  power  which 
led  to  their  survival  and  preeminent  position  through 
favoring  conditions  in  environments,  that  is,  in  geo- 
graphical, geological,  and  biological  conditions  and  re- 
sources ;  through  the  powers  of  endurance,  and  courage, 
and  mind  power,  and  will  power,  which  conflict  with  na- 
ture and  other  races  of  men  in  the  w^orld  is  fitted  to 
develop ;  and  through  the  power  of  self-assurance  which 
comes  of  a  high  moral  sense.  Hence  victory,  survival. 
The  survival  of  the  fittest  is  a  fact ;  and  the  fact  accounts 
in  part  for  the  geographical  distribution  of  the  races  of 
men  now  existing  and  still  in  progress ;  but  not  for  the 
existence  of  the  fittest  nor  for  the  power  that  has  deter- 
mined survival. 

In  this  half-hearted  avowal  of  Darwinism  the  Yale 
geologist  betrays  a  certain  confusion  on  the  subject. 
Asa  Gray  suggested  such  a  confusion  or  lack  of  compre- 
hension when  he  wrote  to  Dana:  "  Every  now  and  then 


THE  RECEPTION  OF  DARWINISM  201 

something  you  write  makes  me  doul)t  if  you  quite  get 
hold  of  Darwinian  natural  selection.  .  .  .  Suppose  the 
term  be  a  personification,  as,  no  doubt,  strictly  it  is.  One 
so  fond  as  you  are  of  personification  ought  not  to  object 
to  what  seems  to  me  a  happy  term." 

The  reception  of  Darwinism  at  Yale  College  was 
lukewarm.  A  similar  state  of  affairs  existed  at  Prince- 
ton. In  President  McCosh  we  have  a  treatment  clear, 
candid,  and  incisive,  but  a  method  of  approach  ominous 
to  scientific  naturalism.  The  new  college  head  tells  us 
that  he  was  not  a  week  in  Princeton  till  he  let  it  be  known 
to  the  upper  classes  of  the  college  that  he  was  in  favor 
of  evolution — properly  limited  and  explained.  This 
qualification  is  in  harmony  with  the  speaker's  previous 
words.  In  his  first  published  volume.  The  Method  of  the 
Divine  Government,  he  sought  to  unfold  the  plan  by 
which  God  governs  the  world.  He  concedes  that  he 
found  it  in  an  orderly  manner— that  is,  by  law.  He  is 
now  prepared  to  believe  that  there  might  be  a  like  method 
in  the  organic  kingdoms  and  to  listen  to  Darwin  when  he 
showed  that  there  was  a  regular  instrumentality  in  the 
descent  of  plants  and  animals.  In  place,  then,  of  undis- 
criminating  denunciation  of  evolution  from  so  many 
pulpits,  periodicals,  and  seminaries,  a  denunciation 
which  assumes  evolution  and  Christianity  incompatible, 
the  Princetonian  propounds  a  definition  to  harmonize  the 
two :  Evolution  is  the  drawing  of  one  thing  out  of  an- 
other; it  proceeds  from  causation  which  is  universal,  for 
in  the  world  things  are  so  connected  that  every  one 
thing  proceeds  from  some  other,  and  all  things  from 
God.  This  is  the  dogma.  Can  it  be  proved  ?  Darwin  is 
constantly  making  the  distinction  between  natural  selec- 
tion and  supernatural  design,  between  natural  law  and 
special  creation.     Now,  the  difference  between  the  two 


202  EVOLUTIONISM 

opposing  theories  as  thus  put  is  misleading,  since  the 
supernatural  power  is  to  be  recognized  in  the  natural 
law,  the  Creator's  power  being  executed  by  the  creature's 
action,  the  design  seen  in  the  mechanism.  Chance  is 
obliged  to  vanish  because  we  see  contrivance.  There 
is  purpose  when  we  see  a  beneficent  end  accomplished. 

iSo  much  for  the  preamble.  Apparently  the  newly 
imported  Scottish  divine  is  back  in  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, the  age  of  reason,  which  saw  in  all  things  benevo- 
lence and  design.  That  attitude  was  more  fully  ex- 
pressed in  McCosh's  joint  work  on  Typical  Forms  and 
Special  Ends  in  Creation.  But  he  now  recognizes  that 
the  matter  is  not  so  easy  of  solution.  It  will  not  do  to 
Platonize.  The  types  of  the  animal  kingdom  have  been 
fondly  contemplated  and  admired  by  our  profounder 
minds.  They  have  been  identified  with  the  grand  ideas 
which,  according  to  Plato,  have  been  in  or  before  the 
divine  mind  from  all  eternity.  Pious  minds  like  Cuvier 
have  ascribed  them  to  God,  whose  thoughts  are  embodied 
in  them.  On  the  other  hand,  the  great  rival  of  Cuvier, 
St.  Ililaire,  ascribed  the  types  to  a  common  descent,  and 
used  language  which  sounded  as  if  the  animal  by  its 
Avishes  could  add  to  its  organs;  could  call  forth  fins  to 
swim  with,  and  wings  to  fly.  The  controversy  came  to 
a  head  when  Goethe  declared  that  it  was  of  more 
importance  than  the  French  Revolution. 

There  is  undoubtedly  a  difference  between  the  two 
views;  but  McCosh  asks  if  there  may  not  be  a  recon- 
ciliation? It  may  be  by  descent  that  types  are 
formed,  and  yet  all  be  done  by  a  plan  in  the 
divine  wisdom  which  is  thus  manifested.  The  two 
great  Swiss-American  naturalists,  Agassiz  and  Guyot, 
delighted  to  perceive  clearly  that  there  w^as  a 
system   in    the   descent   of   animals    which   they   were 


THE  RECEPTION  OF  DARWINISM  203 

sure  was  conceived  in  the  divine  mind,  but  doubted 
whether  it  could  have  been  produced  by  natural 
law  or  material  agency.  But  surely,  in  analogy  with 
divine  procedure  in  all  other  parts  of  nature,  we  may 
discover  a  divine  plan,  and  at  the  same  time  a  creature 
agency  to  carry  it  out,  which  agency  makes  known  God's 
plan  to  us.  We  may  see  that  the  relations  which  con- 
stitute types  are  genetic,  and  as  we  perceive  in  them 
wisdom  and  beauty,  we  can  also  perceive  that  they  are 
instituted  by  God.  This  view  gives  to  classes  a  con- 
nection in  the  very  nature  of  things,  and  makes  species 
intelligible  to  human  intelligence,  which  thereby  rises  to 
some  comprehension  of  divine  intelligence,  in  the  image 
of  which  human  intelligence  is  formed. 

The  ground  is  gone  over  again  and  the  same  conclu- 
sion reached, — the  comfortable  conclusion  of  benevo- 
lence, design,  and  the  human  capacity  to  comprehend  the 
cosmic  purposes.  Anything  the  scientist  brings  for- 
ward may  be  clearly  beheld  in  this  bright  light  of  optim- 
ism. When  the  geologist  points  out  the  scries  of  changes 
in  the  horse  tribe  from  the  five-  to  the  one-toed  varieties, 
the  writer  holds  that  it  is  all  for  the  best :  God  has  pro- 
vided the  horse  wnth  its  hard  hoof  for  man,  who  to 
make  it  harder  adds  a  shoe.  "  I  hold  that  there  are  as 
clear  proofs  of  design  in  the  hoof  as  in  the  shoe  upon 
it."  Against  this  complacent  supematuralism  the  new 
doctrines  make  but  little  headway.  McCo.sh  mentions 
among  the  causes  of  variation  the  one  to  which  Darwin 
has  given  such  prominence.  It  is  natural  selection, 
which  to  McCosh  seems  a  not  very  happy  phrase,  as  it 
is  apt  to  leave  the  impression  that  there  is  a  choice  on 
the  part  of  nature,  whereas  it  is  all  produced  by  the 
arrangements  made  by  the  Creator.  This  is  the  doctrine 
of  final  cause,  a  doctrine  of  natural  religion.    Neverthe- 


204  EVOLUTIONISM 

less  it  is  not  opposed  to  the  absolute  mutability  of 
species,  which  in  its  turn  has  become  almost  a  religious 
doctrine,  around  which  has  gathered  a  sacred  feeling 
which  it  is  thought  dangerous  to  disturb.  With  this 
opinion  McCosh  has  little  patience.  It  is  a  question  for 
science  to  settle  and  not  religion. 

To  science,  then,  the  author  turns  to  trace  the  geo- 
logical history  of  the  earth.  His  data  he  draws  chiefly 
from  Dana  of  Yale  and  Guyot  of  Princeton — both 
"  reconcilers  "  of  Genesis  and  geology.  From  these 
data  he  argues  that  that  which  the  scientists  call  a  sys- 
tem is  what  Platonists  call  an  idea,  and  theologians  de- 
sign or  purpose  in  the  history  of  organic  life.  Of  course 
in  all  this  there  is  the  universal  law,  established  by  a 
wide  and  uncontradicted  experience  that  nature  is  uni- 
form. This  much  against  the  anti-evolutionists.  But 
at  this  point  also  extreme  evolutionists  are  to  be  met,  by 
showing  that  there  are  other  powers  which  have  modi- 
fied evolution  such  as  light,  life,  sensation,  instinct,  in- 
telligence, morality ! 

The  Princetonian  has  missed  the  chief  point  made  by 
naturalism.  When  he  claims  that  none  of  these  agents 
are  producible  by  the  power  of  nature,  he  shows  him- 
self incapable  of  grasping  the  doctrine  of  immanence,  the 
belief  in  a  universal  principle  inclusive  of  these  mani- 
fold agencies  and  all  to  be  put  under  the  name  of  nature. 
The  old-fashioned  dualism  of  this  thinker  is  again  ex- 
posed. As  evolution  by  physical  causes  cannot  produce 
life  with  all  its  variations,  he  infers  that  God  does  it  by  an 
immediate  fiat,  even  as  he  created  matter  and  the  forces 
tliat  act  in  matter.  All  that  can  be  allowed  in  restating 
the  problem  is  that  Darwinism  has  modified  design  only 
to  this  extent :  by  making  these  high  agencies  an  act  of 
Providence  instead  of  an  act  of  creation.    It  is  not  neces- 


THE  RECEPTION  OF  DARWINISM  205 

sarj'  to  go  much  further  in  exposition  of  the  views  of  Mc- 
Cosh,  They  are  more  fully  set  forth  in  another  book — 
Development :  What  It  Can  Do,  and  What  It  Cannot  Do. 
But  a  word  more  is  needed  on  the  attitude  of  the  man 
toward  the  whole  movement.  He  has  been  held  to  have 
welcomed  Darwinism,  and  to  have  set  evolutionism  on  its 
legs  in  a  conservative  community.  The  truth  of  the  mat- 
ter is  quite  the  contrary.  Evolution  might  be  discussed 
in  the  college,  but  in  the  eighteenth,  not  the  nineteenth 
century  meaning  of  the  term.  Defined  originally  as  the 
drawing  of  one  thing  out  of  another  the  conclusions 
drawn  from  it  were  didactic.  The  college  head  hence- 
forth shall  do  the  thinking  for  his  pupils.  Darwinism 
never  teaches  that  nature  is  red  in  tooth  and  claw,  but 
that  the  survival  of  the  fittest  is  a  beneficial  law.  Just  as 
the  common  soldier  did  not  discover  all  the  wisdom  of 
Napoleon,  so  this,  McCosh  concludes,  should  be  our  posi- 
tion in  regard  to  God's  works:  we  discover  enough  of  the 
arc  to  calculate  th-e  rest ;  and  as  we  see  so  much  wisdom  in 
the  little  that  we  know,  we  argue  that  there  is  vastly 
more  in  the  much  that  is  beyond. 

The  compromising  deist  of  the  previous  century  speaks 
in  the  Scottish- American  divine.  He  fully  admits  that 
there  are  results  following  from  the  laws  of  God  which 
it  is  not  easy  to  reconcile  with  the  omniscience  and 
benevolence  of  the  deity,  yet  since  "  by  a  higher  arrange- 
ment of  nature,  or  rather,  the  God  of  nature,  the  organic 
world  is  progressing.  .  .  .  There  are  cereals  when  before 
there  were  only  heaths  and  mosses,  and  man  himself  is 
further  removed  from  the  savage  state.  .  .  .  We  have 
thus  a  promise  that  the  earth  may  become  a  perfect  abode 
for  a  perfected  humanity." 

IMcCosh  has  been  considered  by  some  Princetonians  an 
advocate  of  Darwinism.    But  as  Alexander  Ormond  has 


L'0(J  EVOLUTIONISM 

pointed  out,  lie  never  became  an  evolutionist  in  his 
fundamental  thought,  and  was  never  able  to  enter  into 
tiie  new  theoiy  because  his  age  was  a  period  of  transition. 
The  same  may  be  said  of  McCosh's  learned  pupil, 
Charles  Woodruff  Shields.  The  latter  asserts,  in  his 
Philosophia  Ultiina,  that  his  master  from  the  first  had  led 
the  creationists  into  alignment  with  the  evolutionists  and 
adds  that  from  present  signs  it  would  seem  that  the  tide 
of  controversy  has  turned  in  favor  of  evolution,  in  some 
form  and  degree  as  logically  consistent  with  the  strictest 
creationalism.  Shields  makes  this  assertion,  despite  the 
fact  that  there  are  two  rival  schools  which  have  arisen  in 
the  attempt  to  solve  the  great  metaphysical  problem,  the 
development  of  absolute  being.  According  to  the  former, 
he  explains,  the  whole  universe,  both  spiritual  and  ma- 
terial, has  proceeded  from  deity,  by  successive  acts  of 
creation.  According  to  the  opposite  school  of  thinkers, 
the  totality  of  existence  proceeds  from  some  creative  sub- 
stance or  principle,  under  physical  laws  of  evolution,  em- 
bracing all  mental  as  well  as  material  phenomena.  This 
is  a  fair  generalization.  So  is  the  next  to  the  effect  that 
while  German  thinkers  attempt  chiefly  the  problem  of 
harmonizing  the  physical  with  the  logical  development 
of  the  universe  as  projected  by  science  and  philosophy, 
English  and  American  writers  deal  largely  with  the  more 
practical  task  of  reconciling  evolution  with  morality,  re- 
ligion, and  orthodoxy. 

The  latter  point  of  view  is  peculiarly  that  of  Shields. 
The  great  aim  of  his  Fhwl  Philosophy  is  to  give  a  survey 
of  the  sciences  wherein  rational  and  revealed  are  ulti- 
mately brought  into  reconciliation.  The  method  of  recon- 
ciliation in  the  case  of  evolution  is  somewhat  strained. 
It  consists  in  giving  high  praise  to  the  supernaturalists 
and  faint  praise  to  the  naturalists.    For  example,  in  the 


THE  RECEPTION  OF  DARWINISM  207 

case  of  the  anthropological  science  concerning  the  doc- 
trine of  human  evolution,  "  distinguished  "  biologists 
have  maintained  that  the  foetal  development  of  man,  so 
far  from  proving  his  animal  pedigree,  merely  reflects 
that  unity  of  plan  which  has  pervaded  the  organic  world 
from  the  beginning.  Likewise,  "  leading  "  ethnologists 
hold  that  there  is  a  profound  gulf  without  connection  or 
passage,  separating  the  human  species  from  every  other. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  "  so-called  "  areha?o-geologists 
have  also  been  met  upon  their  own  ground,  Dawson,  for 
instance,  maintaining  that  the  famous  Neanderthal  skull 
is  simply  exceptional.  ...  In  short,  if  the  "  notion  " 
of  transmutation  be  separated  from  that  of  progression, 
we  can  readily  imagine  the  scale  of  civilized  and  savage 
humanity  descending  as  well  as  ascending  from  the 
image  of  a  God  and  the  image  of  an  ape. 

The  animus  of  Shields'  voluminous  work  is  finally  laid 
bare  by  such  statements  as  these, — that  Joseph  Vandyke 
has  argued  elaborately  that  both  theism  and  revelation 
are  required  to  explain  the  origin  of  man ;  and  that  al- 
though the  Presbyterian  Professor  Woodrow,  of  South 
Carolina,  has  been  deprived  of  his  theological  chair  for 
teaching  a  partial  evolution,  yet  President  Patton  has 
stated  the  theory  as  still  a  hopeful  problem  in  apologetics. 

Shields  made  a  valiant  attempt  to  be  a  balance-wheel 
between  two  opposite  forces,  but  the  dead  weight  of 
dogma  pulled  him  back.  Thus  while  he  can  assert  that 
George  Ticknor  Curtis  has  "  judicially  "  tested  the  theory 
of  evolution  and  found  it  not  proven,  Charles  Darwin 
remains  for  him  a  mere  "  speculative  "  naturalist.  In 
fine.  Shields,  like  his  master  McCosh,  was  in  an  age  of 
transition  and  unable  to  grasp  the  significance  of  the 
new  movement. 

We  now  turn  from  the  apologist  of  Princeton  to  an- 


20S  EVOLUTIONISM 

other  thinker  in  a  neighboring  university,  who,  although 
a  transitionalist,  was  also  a  transrautationist.  Edward 
Cope  of  Philadelphia  has  the  distinction  of  having 
founded  an  "  American  school  of  biology  "  which  at- 
tempted to  go  beyond  Darwin 's  natural  selection.  Cope 's 
evolutionar}"  philosophy  was  expressed  in  his  chief  work, 
The  Origin  of  the  Fittest.  This  work  was  notable  coming 
at  the  time  it  did.  In  Philadelphia  the  tradition  of  free- 
thought  had  run  into  a  narrow  channel,  but  it  was  still 
partially  preserved  in  the  University  and  in  those  scien- 
tific societies  fathered  by  Franklin.  But  the  public  in 
general  had  lost  that  tradition  of  liberalism,  and  the 
town  which  had  once  been  so  hospitable  to  all  comers  had 
now  closed  its  doors  to  foreign  thought.  Therefore,  Cope 
expostulates,  let  those  excellent  people  in  whose  minds 
there  is  considerable  repugnance  to  the  acceptance,  or 
even  consideration  of  the  hypothesis  of  development, 
restrain  their  condemnation.  They  may  object  that  the 
human  species  is  certainly  involved  and  man's  ascent 
from  the  ape  asserted ;  and  also  that  the  scheme  in  gen- 
eral seems  to  conflict  with  that  presented  by  the  IMosaic 
account  of  creation ;  but  it  now  behooves  those  interested 
to  explain  the  events  and  to  look  any  consequent  neces- 
sary modification  of  their  metaphysical  or  theological 
views  squarely  in  the  face. 

Of  the  two  main  consequences  above  portrayed,  the 
first  seemed  the  more  distasteful.  If  the  hypothesis  here 
maintained  be  true,  explains  the  naturalist,  man  is  the 
descendant  of  some  preexistent  generic  type,  the  which, 
if  it  were  now  living,  we  would  probably  call  an  ape.  It 
would  be  an  objection  of  little  weight  could  it  be  truly 
urged  that  there  have  as  yet  been  discovered  no  remains 
of  ape-like  men,  for  we  have  frequently  been  called  upon 
in   the   course   of  paleontological   discovery   to   bridge 


THE  RECEPTION  OF  DARWINISM  209 

greater  gaps  than  this,  and  greater  remain,  which  we  ex- 
pect to  fill.  But  we  have  ape-like  characters  exhibited  by 
more  than  one  race  of  men  yet  existing.  We  all  admit 
the  existence  of  higher  and  lower  races,  the  latter  being 
those  which  we  now  find  to  present  greater  or  less  ap- 
proximations to  the  apes.  The  peculiar  structural  char- 
acters that  belong  to  the  negro  in  his  most  typical  form 
are  of  that  kind,  however  great  may  be  the  distance  of 
his  remove  therefrom.  The  flattening  of  the  nose  and 
prolongation  of  the  jaws  constitute  such  a  resemblance; 
so  do  the  deficiency  of  the  calf  of  the  leg,  and  the  ob- 
liquity of  the  pelvis,  which  approaches  more  the  horizon- 
tal position  than  it  does  in  the  Caucasian.  The  investi- 
gations made  at  Washington  during  the  war,  with  refer- 
ence to  the  physical  characteristics  of  the  soldiei-s,  show 
that  the  arms  of  the  negro  are  from  one  to  two  inches 
longer  than  those  of  the  whites:  another  approximation 
to  the  ape.  In  fact,  this  race  is  a  species  of  the  genus 
Homo  as  distinct  in  character  from  the  Caucasian  as 
those  we  are  accustomed  to  recognize  in  other  depart- 
ments of  the  animal  kingdom ;  but  he  is  not  distinct  by 
isolation,  since  intermediate  forms  between  him  and  the 
other  species  can  be  abundantly  found. 

The  second  objection  as  to  the  conflict  between  the 
]Mosaic  account  of  creation  and  the  Darwinian  is  to  be 
met  in  the  same  way.  "  Believe  in  the  expert  "  and  the 
old  view  goes  by  the  board.  The  modern  theory  of 
evolution  has  met  with  remarkably  rapid  acceptance  by 
those  best  qualified  to  judge  of  its  merits,  namely,  the 
zoologists  and  botanists,  while  probably  the  majority  of 
the  public,  in  this  region  at  least,  profess  to  reject  it. 
This  inconsistency  is  due  to  two  causes.  In  the  first 
place,  Darwin's  demonstration  contained  in  the  Origin 
cf   Species   proves   little    more    than   that    the   species 


210  EVOLUTIONISM 

of  the  same  genus  have  had  common  origin,  and 
also  his  theory  of  natural  selection  is  incomplete  as  an 
explanation  of  their  origin.  In  the  second  place,  the 
unscientific  world  is  unreasonable,  little  knowing  the 
slow  steps  and  laborious  effort  by  which  any  general 
truth  is  reached.  Hence  they  find  in  incompleteness 
ground  of  condemnation  of  the  whole.  Now  Science  is 
glad  if  she  can  prove  that  the  earth  stands  on  an  ele- 
phant, and  gladder  if  she  can  demonstrate  that  the  ele- 
phant stands  on  a  turtle;  but  if  she  cannot  show  the 
support  of  the  turtle  she  is  not  discouraged,  but  labors 
patiently,  trusting  that  the  future  of  discovery  will 
justify  the  experience  of  the  past. 

Cope's  appeal  to  the  higher  court  of  the  expert  is  not 
an  appeal  to  authority,  nor  a  mere  substitute  of  present 
for  past  dogma.  If  some  of  the  people  find  Darwin's 
argument  incomplete,  or  in  some  points  weak,  it  may  be 
answered  so  do  the  student  classes,  who,  nevertheless,  be- 
lieve it.  This  is  largely  because  Darwin's  facts  and 
thoughts  repeat  a  vast  multiplicity  of  experiences  of 
every  student,  which  are  of  as  much  significance  as  those 
cited  by  him,  and  which  only  required  a  courageous 
officer  to  marshal  them  into  line,  a  mighty  host,  conquer- 
ing and  to  conquer.  These  will  slowly  find  their  way 
into  print,  some  in  one  country  and  some  in  another. 

In  distinguishing  between  the  fact  of  evolution  and  the 
various  views  of  evolution.  Cope  effectively  meets  the  ob- 
jections of  the  old  school  against  the  new  theory.  The 
evidence  in  favor  of  evolution,  he  explains,  is  abundant ; 
much  less  has  been  done  in  explanation  of  the  law  of 
evolution.  Darwin  and  his  immediate  followers  have 
brought  out  the  law  of  natural  selection;  Spencer  has 
endeavored  to  express  them  in  terms  of  force;  while, 
among  Americans,  Hyatt,  Packard,  and  Cope  himself 


COSMIC  PHILOSOPHY:  JOHN  FISKE  211 

advanced  the  law  of  acceleration  and  retardation.  It  is 
this  latter  group,  headed  by  Cope,  that  has  been  called 
the  American  biological  school.  Out  of  this  school  we 
shall  take  up  later  one  notable  living  representative, 
James  ]\[ark  Baldwin.  iMeauwhile  we  must  turn  from  the 
philosophy  of  the  chair  to  that  of  the  rostrum,  and  con- 
sider a  popular  representative  of  the  movement. 

4.   Cosmic  Philosophy:  John  Fiske 

As  a  summarizer  of  the  controversy  between  special 
creation  and  derivation  John  Fiske  has  given  us  the 
clearest  contemporary  account.  This  account,  as  Josiah 
Royce  has  pointed  out,  is  somewhat  rancorous,  because 
at  that  time  Agassiz  still  dominated  the  current  teach- 
ing, and  the  Darwinian  theory  was  still  on  trial  before 
the  public.  That  public  was  given  its  choice.  Was  it  to 
be  special  creation  or  derivation?  The  pedigree  of  the 
two  theories  has  something  to  do  with  the  decision.  The 
former  hypothesis,  says'  Fiske,  originated  in  the  crude 
mythological  conceptions  of  the  ancient  Hebrews  and  was 
imcritically  accepted  until  the  time  of  Lamarck  and 
Goethe.  The  latter  hypothesis  originated  in  the  method- 
ical studies  of  the  phendmenon  of  organic  life,  and  has 
been  held  by  a  large  number  of  biologists  during  the  first 
half  of  the  nineteenth  century.  Now,  while  the  Hebrew 
writer  presents  us  with  a  concrete  picture  of  the  crea- 
tion of  man,  a  homogeneous  clay  model  of  the  human  form 
at  once  transmuted  into  a  heterogeneous  combination  of 
organs  and  ti.ssues — the  few  naturalists  who  still  make  a 
show  of  upliolding  the  special  creation  hypothe.sis  care- 
fully refrain  from  specification.  When  challenged  they 
take  refuge  in  grandiloquent  phrases  about  "  Creative 
Will  "  and  "  free  action  of  an  Intelligent  Power," — 


212  EVOLUTIONISM 

very  niucli  as  the  cuttlefish  extricates  itself  from  a  dis- 
agreeable predicament  by  hiding  in  a  shower  of  its  own 
ink.  When  translated,  however,  from  the  dialect  of 
mythology  into  the  dialect  of  science,  the  special  crea- 
tion hypothesis  falls  flat.  It  asserts  that  untold  millions 
of  molecules  rushed  together  at  some  appointed  instant 
from  divers  quarters  and  grouped  themselves  into  an 
adult  mammal.  .  .  .  Such  an  hypothesis,  which  involves 
such  an  assumption,  is  at  once  excluded  from  the  pale  of 
science. 

The  opposite  hypothesis,  that  of  derivation,  has  four 
kinds  of  arguments  in  its  favor.  The  first  of  these  is 
classification.  This  is  not  the  scheme  of  Agassiz,  who  at- 
tempted to  explain  the  four  distinct  types  of  animal 
structure  by  resuscitating  from  its  moss-covered  tomb  the 
Platonic  theory  of  ideas.  Hardly !  The  scientific  scheme 
of  classification  is  a  complex  arrangement  of  organisms 
in  groups  within  groups,  resembling  each  other  at  the 
bottom  of  the  scale  and  differing  most  widely  at  the 
top.  Now,  if  each  species  has  been  separately  created,  no 
reason  can  be  assigned  for  such  an  arrangement, — unless 
perchance  someone  can  be  found  hardy  enough  to  main- 
tain that  it  was  intended  as  a  snare  and  a  delusion  for 
human  intelligence.  The  old  opponents  of  geology,  who 
strove  to  maintain  at  whatever  cost  the  scientific  credit  of 
the  Mosaic  myth  of  the  creation,  asserted  that  fossil 
plants  and  animals  were  created  already  dead  and  pet- 
rified, just  for  the  fun  of  the  thing.  Manifestly  those 
persons  take  a  quite  similar  position  who  pretend  that 
God  created  separately  the  horse,  ass,  zebra,  and  quagga, 
having  previously  created  a  beast  enough  like  all  of 
them  to  be  their  common  grandfather.  Now,  the  true 
thcorj'  of  classification  depends  not  upon  special  creation, 
but  common  origin,  a  given  family  being  capable  of  ar- 


COSMIC  PHILOSOPHY:  JOHN  FISKE  213 

rangement  iu  clivcrging  groups  ami  sub-groups,  along 
lines  which  ramify  like  branches,  branchlets,  and  twigs 
of  a  tree. 

An  equally  powerful  argument  is  furnished  by  the 
embryonic  development  of  organisms.  Why  does  a  mam- 
mal begin  to  develop  as  if  it  were  going  to  become  a 
fish,  and  then,  changing  its  course,  act  as  if  it  were  going 
to  become  a  reptile  or  bird,  and  only  after  much  delay 
assume  the  peculiar  characteristics  of  mammals?  On 
the  evolutionary  theory,  these  phenomena  are  explicable 
as  due  to  the  integration  or  summing-up  of  adaptive 
processes  by  which  modifications,  slowly  acquired  through 
generations  of  ancestral  organisms,  are  more  and  more 
rapidly  repeated  in  the  embryo.  On  the  hypothesis  that 
each  species  of  organisms  was  independently  built  up  by 
a  divine  architect,  how  are  we  to  explain  these  circuitous 
proceedings?  Unless  it  were  due  to  recapitulation,  the 
process  would  be  as  futile  as  the  work  of  an  architect  who 
could  not  erect  a  palace,  except  by  first  using  his  ma- 
terials in  the  shape  of  a  hut,  and  then  rebuilding  the  hut 
as  a  cottage,  and  finally  as  a  palace.  Again  there  are 
the  equally  significant  facts  of  morphology.  Why,  unless 
through  common  inheritance,  should  all  vertebrates  be 
constructed  on  the  same  type?  It  is  a  familiar  fact  that 
the  arms  of  men  and  apes,  the  forelegs  of  quadrupeds, 
the  wings  of  birds,  and  the  breast  fins  of  fishes  are 
structurally  identical,  being  developed  from  the  same 
embryonal  rudiments.  Why  is  this  so?  But  two  an- 
swers are  possible.  We  may  either  say,  with  the  Mussul- 
man, "it  so  pleased  Allah,  whose  name  be  exalted  "; 
or  we  may  honestly  aclaiowledge  the  scientific  implica- 
tion that  such  community  of  structure  is  strong  evidence 
in  favor  of  community  of  origin.  Finally,  the  facts  of 
geographical  distribution  and  geological  succession  are  in 


214  EVOLUTIONISM 

complete  harmony  with  the  development  theory.  On  the 
hypothesis  of  special  creations,  no  good  reason  can  be 
given  why  the  extinct  animals  found  in  any  geographical 
area  should  resemble,  both  in  general  structure  and  in 
special  modifications,  the  animals  which  now  live  in  the 
same  area.  It  has  indeed  been  urged,  by  upholders  of 
the  special  creation  hypothesis,  that  these  striking  re- 
semblances may  be  explained  by  supposing  each  species 
to  have  been  created  in  strict  adaptation  to  the  condi- 
tions of  life  surrounding  it.  But  there  is  no  appreciable 
difference,  for  example,  between  the  conditions  of 
existence  in  the  seas  east  and  west  of  the  Isthmus  of 
Panama ;  yet,  according  to  the  assumption  of  the  special- 
creationists,  their  marine  faunas  ought  to  be  almost 
exactly  alike,  which  they  are  not.  The  presumption 
raised  at  the  outset  against  the  doctrine  of  special  crea- 
tion is  even  superfluously  confirmed  by  the  testimony  of 
facts.  Not  only  is  this  doctrine  discredited  by  its  bar- 
baric origin,  and  by  the  absurd  or  impossible  assump- 
tions which  it  would  require  us  to  make,  but  it  utterly 
fails  to  explain  a  single  one  of  the  phenomena  of  the 
classification,  embryology,  morphology,  and  distribution 
of  extinct  and  living  organisms.  While,  on  the  other 
hand,  the  doctrine  of  derivation  is  not  only  accredited  by 
its  scientific  origin,  and  by  its  appealing  to  none  but  veri- 
fiable processes  and  agencies,  but  it  affords  an  explana- 
tion for  each  and  all  of  the  above-mentioned  phe- 
nomena. 

Such  is  the  contrast  drawn  up  by  Fiske  between  what 
he  comes  to  call  anthropomorphism  and  cosmism.  The 
latter  term  is  a  favorite  with  its  author.  He  applies  it  to 
his  voluminous  work  from  which  this  discussion  of  Dar- 
winism is  taken.  That  work,  on  Cosmic  Philosophy,  is 
in  large  measure  an  interpretation  to  the  American  pub- 


COSMIC  PHILOSOPHY:  JOHN  FISKE  215 

lie  of  the  system  of  Herbert  Spencer,  which,  it  is  hardly 
needful  to  say,  clashed  with  the  old  conservative  view. 
To  those  who  sought  design  and  purpose  in  the  universe 
the  Spencerian  Unknowable  was  like  the  House  of 
Lords, — "  it  did  nothing  in  particular  and  did  it  very 
well."  Now,  this  Spencerian  vagueness  failed  to  satisfy 
even  the  ardent  disciple,  Fiske.  He  therefore  proceeded 
to  modify  that  system.  He  is  opposed  to  any  anthropo- 
morphic theism,  because  personality  and  infinity  are 
terms  expressive  of  ideas  which  are  mutually  incom- 
patible. Nevertheless,  the  phenomenal  universe  is  the 
manifestation  of  some  definite  power.  Here  the  older 
forms  of  design  are  unconvincing.  The  Infinite  does  not 
contrive,  because  the  doctrine  of  evolution  shows  us  that 
the  universe  is  not  a  contrivance,  but  an  organism  with 
an  indwelling  principle  of  life.  It  was  not  made,  but 
has  gro\Mi.  In  a  word,  the  teleology  of  nature  is  an  all- 
pervading  harmony. 

Fiske  as  philosopher  has  at  last  been  forced  into  the 
problem  of  the  relation  of  Darwinism  and  design.  A 
compromise  which  Asa  Gray  attempted,  he  seeks  to  effect. 
The  conclusion  is  interesting,  it  is  the  old  Stoic  solu- 
tion, the  solution  which  requires  an  immanent  principle. 
To  this  view  of  Fiske 's,  Joseph  Cook,  the  Boston  ^londay 
lecturer,  attached  a  name,  remarkable  in  its  anticipation 
of  a  famous  modern  work.  Cook  cites  several  theories  of 
the  origin  of  species,  beginning  with  Cope's  self-elevation 
by  appetency,  and  ending  with  Dana's  adjustment  of 
natural  forces  with  breaks  of  special  intervention.  But 
of  all  the  views  he  gives  fullest  definition  to  this :  Imma- 
nent action  and  direction  of  divine  power,  working  by  the 
purposive  collocation  and  adjustment  of  natural  forces, 
acting  without  breaks, — or  the  theory  of  creative  evolu- 
tion. 


216  EVOLUTIONISM 

With  this  anticipation  of  the  Bergsonian  phrase,  we 
pass  on  to  a  prominent  living  exponent  of  genetic  evolu- 
tionism. 

5.   Genetic  Evolutionism:  James  Mark  Baldwin 

Out  of  a  controversy  with  Cope  has  arisen  one  of  the 
most  fruitful  enlargements  of  Darwinism.  We  refer  to  the 
theory  of  James  Mark  Baldwin  called  ''  Organic  Selec- 
tion "  as  opening  a  sphere  for  the  application  of  the 
principle  of  natural  selection.  Cope  as  a  neo-Lamarck- 
ian  had  emphasized  use-inheritance  and  growth-force. 
Baldwin  as  a  neo-Darwinian  claims  that  these  are  meta- 
physical assumptions  for  which  there  is  only  an  arti- 
ficial need.  As  the  Darwinian  principle  of  natural  selec- 
tion supplanted  the  special-creation  theory,  so  will  the 
new  factor  of  organic  selection  supplant  Cope's  theory 
of  accommodation  by  consciousness.  After  years  of  study 
and  experiment  with  children  the  writer  is  convinced 
that  organic  selection  is  a  direct  substitute  for  Lamarck- 
ian  heredity.  It  avoids  the  occultism  of  physical  trans- 
mission and  puts  in  its  place  social  heredity,  the  ac- 
quisition of  functions  from  the  social  environment.  Thus 
as  soon  as  animals  can  use  their  native  impulses  in  an 
imitative  way  they  begin  to  learn  directly,  by  what  may 
be  called  *'  cross  cuts  "  to  a  desirable  goal,  the  tradi- 
tional habits  of  their  species.  The  chick  which  imitates 
the  hen  in  drinking  does  not  have  to  wait  for  a  happy  ac- 
cident, nor  to  make  a  series  of  experiments,  to  find  out 
that  water  is  to  be  drunk.  All  the  remarkable  accom- 
modations of  an  imitative  sort,  so  conspicuous  in  the 
higher  animals,  enable  them  to  acquire  the  habits  and 
behavior  of  their  kind  without  running  the  risks  of  trial 
and  error.  Calling  this  store  of  habits  of  whatever  kind 
"  tradition,"   and   calling   the  individual's   absorption 


GENETIC  EVOLUTIONISM  217 

of  them  and  his  consequent  education  in  tradition  his 
"  social  heredity,"  we  have  a  more  or  less  independent 
determining  factor  in  evolution. 

Organic  selection  becomes,  accordingly,  a  universal 
principle  in  so  far  as  accommodation  is  universal.  This 
meets  the  view  of  the  Lamarckiaus  that  evolution  does 
somehow  reflect  individual  progress ;  but  it  meets  it  with- 
out adopting  the  principle  of  Lamarckian  inheritance. 
Indeed  it  would  seem  that  high  intellectual  and  moral 
progress  are  matters  of  social  accommodation  rather  than 
that  of  direct  natural  inheritance  on  the  part  of  indi- 
viduals. Galton  has  shown  how  rare  a  thing  it  is  for 
artistic,  literary,  or  other  marked  talent  to  maintain  its 
strength  in  later  generations.  Instead,  we  find  such  en- 
dowments showing  themselves  in  many  individuals  at 
about  the  same  time,  in  the  same  communities,  and 
under  common  social  conditions.  Groups  of  artists, 
musicians,  literary  men,  appeared  together,  constituting, 
as  it  were,  a  social  outburst. 

Baldwin's  view  of  the  predominance  of  the  social  fac- 
tor may  throw  some  light  even  on  the  obscure  subject 
of  the  origin  of  the  genius.  It  is  much  more  effective 
in  the  case  of  the  normal  child.  In  his  first  volume  on 
Mental  Development  it  is  shown  that  the  child's  life  his- 
torically is  a  faithful  reproduction  of  his  social  condi- 
tion. He  is,  from  childhood  up,  excessively  receptive 
to  social  suggestion;  his  entire  learning  is  a  process  of 
conforming  to  social  patterns.  The  essential  to  this,  in 
his  heredity,  is  very  great  plasticity,  cerebral  balance 
and  equilibrium,  a  readiness  to  overflow  into  the  new 
channels  which  his  social  environment  dictates.  He  has 
to  learn  everything  for  himself,  and  in  order  to  do  this 
he  must  begin  in  a  state  of  great  plasticity  and  mobility. 
These  social  lessons  which  he  learns  for  himself  take  the 


218  EVOLUTIONISM 

place  largely  of  the  heredity  of  particular  paternal  ac- 
quisitions. The  father  must  have  been  plastic  to  learn, 
and  this  plasticity  is,  so  far  as  the  evidence  goes,  the 
nervous  condition  of  consciousness;  thus  the  father 
learned,  through  his  consciousness,  from  his  social  en- 
vironment. The  child  does  the  same.  What  he  inherits 
is  the  nervous  plasticity  and  the  consciousness.  He 
learns  particular  acts  for  himself ;  and  what  he  learns  is, 
in  its  main  lines,  what  his  father  learned.  So  he  is  just 
as  well  off,  the  child  of  Darwinism,  as  if  he  were  physi- 
cal heir  to  the  acquisitions  which  his  father  made. 

By  his  emphasis  on  the  social,  Baldwin  has  raised  the 
problem  of  evolution  to  a  higher  plane.  Adaptation  by 
intelligent  selection  makes  the  Lamarckian  factor  un- 
necessary. All  the  resources  of  "  social  transmission  " — 
the  handing  down  of  intelligent  acquisitions  by  paternal 
instruction,  imitation,  gregarious  life,  come  indirectly  to 
take  the  place  of  the  physical  inheritance  of  such  adap- 
tations. This  is  the  proof  positive.  The  proof  negative 
lies  in  the  fact  that  most  of  the  psychologists  are  not 
appealed  to  by  the  extreme  facility  and  ease  of  the 
Lamarckian  solution.  If  experience  is  inherited,  why 
have  not  racial  psychological  experiences  of  the  most 
ancient  and  uniform  order — such  as  those  of  space  per- 
ception, time  estimation,  verbal  speech,  the  rudiments  of 
the  three  "  r's,"  drilled  into  every  child  and  used  with 
absolute  uniformity  throughout  life — why  have  not  such 
functions  become  congenital  ? 

As  with  the  human  so  with  the  animal  race.  The 
variations  which  are  not  adequate  at  first,  or  are  only 
partially  correlated,  are  supplemented  by  the  accom- 
modations which  the  creature  makes,  and  so  the  species 
has  the  time  to  perfect  its  inadequate  congenital  mechan- 
ism.   Thus  the  swans  of  Lake  Geneva  show  relatively  dif- 


GENETIC  EVOLUTIONISM  219 

forent  length  of  neck.  Those  with  longer  necks  can  feed 
under  water  over  a  greater  area  of  the  bottom.  Constant 
stretching  of  tlie  neck  not  only  develops  each  swan,  but 
may  be  supposed  to  have  encouraged  variations  in  the 
direction  of  longer  neck,  that  is,  variations  coincident  in 
direction  with  their  active  accommodative  processes.  So 
the  long  neck  has  been  evolved. 

Darwinism  has  been  defended  through  organic  selec- 
tion as  a  substitute  for  use-inheritance.  For  example, 
the  more  trivial  experiences  of  the  individual,  such  as 
body  mutilations,  which  it  is  not  desirable  to  perpetuate, 
would  not  be  taken  up  in  the  evolution  of  the  race.  Or- 
ganic selection  would  set  a  premium  only  on  the  varia- 
tions which  were  important  enough  to  be  of  some  material 
use,  just  as  the  new  science  of  eugenics  is  founded  upon 
the  possibility  of  carrying  further  in  a  systematic  way 
the  intentional  improvement  of  the  race.  In  regard  to  the 
exclusive  production  of  reflexes,  as  would  be  the  case 
under  use-inheritance,  organic  selection  is  adverse.  In- 
stead of  the  rigidity  of  inherited  instincts  we  have  the 
plasticity  possible  under  the  minimum  of  instinctive 
equipment.  A  chick,  for  example,  is  bound  down  by  a 
mass  of  inherited  reflexes.  The  child,  though  at  first  help- 
loss  from  its  lack  of  instinctive  tendencies,  has  an  enor- 
mous advantage  in  being  able  to  pick  and  choose  by 
means  of  intelligence.  It  is  intelligence  which  secures 
the  widest  possible  range  of  personal  adjustments,  and 
])y  so  doing  widens  the  sphere  of  organic  selection,  so 
that  the  creature  which  thinks  has  a  general  screen 
from  the  action  of  natural  selection.  The  .struggle  for 
existence,  depending  upon  the  physical  qualities  on 
which  the  animals  rely,  is  in  some  degree  done  away 
with. 

Organic    selection    has    now    reached    an    interesting 


220  EVOLUTIONISM 

speculative  position.  In  protesting  against  rigid  in- 
heritance it  brings  in  accommodation.  In  emphasizing 
intelligence  it  brings  in  educability.  The  old  dualism  is 
breaking  down.  By  rendering  the  physical  plastic,  the 
physical  becomes  permeable  to  intellect.  Out  of  this 
emerges  a  new  phase  of  freedom.  Instead  of  the  deter- 
minism either  of  the  old  preformism  or  that  of  mere 
mechanical  natural  selection  we  have  a  case  where  natu- 
ral selection  operates  to  preserve  creatures,  because  they 
adapt  themselves  to  their  environment.  The  directive 
factor  is  now  largely  self-directive,  since  the  intelligence 
represents  the  highest  and  most  specialized  form  of 
accommodation.  In  a  word,  organic  selection  has  sup- 
plemented and  enlarged  the  old  natural  selection  by 
bringing  in  the  doctrine  of  the  survival  of  the  accom- 
modating. Organic  selection,  then,  has  this  summary 
advantage:  It  opens  a  great  sphere  for  the  application 
of  the  principle  of  natural  selection  upon  organisms, 
that  is,  selection  on  the  basis  of  what  they  do,  rather 
than  of  what  they  are;  of  the  new  use  they  make 
of  their  functions,  rather  than  of  the  mere  possession  of 
certain  congenital  characters.  A  premium  is  set  on 
plasticity  and  adaptability  of  function  rather  than  on 
congenital  fixity  of  structure;  and  this  adaptability 
reaches  its  highest  level  in  the  intelligence. 

With  the  entrance  of  consciousness  as  the  vehicle  of 
accommodation  we  are  ready  to  consider  the  place  of 
individual  purpose  in  evolution.  As  supplemented  by 
organic  selection  natural  selection  is  now  seen  to  be  not 
unteleological.  The  charge  made  against  Darwinism 
was  that,  with  its  emphasis  on  **  chance  "  and  on  the 
"  fortuitous,"  its  workings  were  blind  and  capricious. 
This  charge  can  be  met,  answers  Baldwin:  It  has  been 
found  that  biological  phenomena — variations  in  particu- 


GENETIC  EVOLUTIONISM  221 

lar — follow  the  definite  law  of  probability;  ia  short, 
that  there  is  no  such  thing  in  nature  as  tlie  really  fortu- 
itous or  unpredictable.  Natural  selection,  therefore, 
■svorks  upon  variations  which  are  themselves  subject  to 
law.  If  this  be  true,  then  natural  selection  may  be  the 
method  of  realizing  a  cosmic  design,  if  such  exists,  the 
law  of  variation  guaranteeing  the  presence  of  a  fixed 
proportional  number  of  individuals  which  are  "  fit  " 
with  reference  to  a  preestablished  end.  ...  A  good 
illustration  may  be  seen  in  the  use  made  of  vital  statis- 
tics in  life  insurance.  We  pay  a  premium  rate  based  on 
the  calculation  of  the  probability  of  life,  and  thus  by 
observing  this  law  realize  the  teleological  purpose  of 
providing  for  our  children;  and  we  do  it  more  effect- 
ively, though  indirectly,  than  if  we  carried  our  money  in 
bags  around  our  necks,  and  gradually  added  our  sav- 
ings to  it.  Furthermore,  the  insurance  company  is  a 
great  teleological  agency,  both  for  us  and  for  itself ;  for 
it  also  secures  dividends  for  its  stockholders  on  the  basis 
of  charges  adjusted  to  the  "  chances  "  of  life,  drawn 
from  the  mortality  tables.  Why  is  it  not  a  reasonable 
view  that  cosmic  Purpose — if  we  may  call  it  so — works 
by  similar,  but  more  adequate,  knowledge  of  the  whole 
and  so  secures  its  results — whether  in  conformity  to  or 
in  contravention  of  our  individual  striving  ? 

In  raising  these  questions  the  author  disavows  any 
attempt  to  carry  them  out  into  a  philosophical  view  of 
reality,  a  theoretical  doctrine  of  metaphysics.  Neverthe- 
less in  a  series  of  illuminating  figures  he  does  suggest 
a  metaphysics  of  the  most  stimulating  sort.  Genetic 
science,  he  explains,  in  the  presence  of  an  exact  and 
numerical  science  must  make  the  reservation  that  it  is  a 
cross-section,  not  a  longitudinal  section  to  which  the 
quantitative  and  analytical  formulas  apply.    But  keep- 


2'22  EVOLUTIONISM 

ing  ill  mind  the  old  Greek  antithesis  between  being  and 
becoming,  genetic  science,  as  a  science  of  development 
and  evolution,  must  preserve  the  prospective  attitude. 
This,  then,  is  the  chief  postulate  of  the  theory  of  genetic 
modes,  that  that  series  of  events  only  is  truly  genetic 
which  cannot  be  constructed  before  it  has  happened,  and 
which  cannot  be  exliausted  by  reading  backward  after 
it  has  happened.    As  between  the  purely  mechanical  or 
mathematical  sciences  and  that  of  the  next  ascending  set 
of  phenomena,  biologj^,  recent  discussion  is  full  of  il- 
luminating matter  which  might  be  cited  in  support  of 
these  principles.    That  the  synthesis  which  is  called  life 
is  different  in  some  respects  from  that  of  chemistry  is 
not  only  the  contention  of  the  vitalists,  but  also  the  ad- 
mission of  the  adherents  of  a  physico-chemical  theory 
of  life.    In  reply  to  those  who  think  not  only  that  living 
matter  is  a  chemical  compound,  but  also  that  there  is 
nothing  to  add  to  this  chemical  formula — when  once  it 
is  discovered — in  order  to  attain  a  final  explanation  of 
life,  we  have  only  to  put  to  them  the  further  problem 
of  genesis,  as  over  and  above  that  of  analysis — that  is, 
to  ask  not  only  for  the  analytic  formula,  the  chemical 
formula,  for  protoplasm,  but  also  for  the  laws  of  repro- 
duction and  growth,  which  always  characterize  life.    The 
cross-section    formula    must   be    supplemented    by    the 
longitudinal-section  formula.    Here  we  discover  the  fact 
that  the  development  is  by  a  series  of  syntheses,  each 
chemical,  but  each,  so  far  as  we  know,  producing  some- 
thing new — a  new  genetic  mode.     If  this  be  denied, 
then  we  have  to  ask  the  chemist  to  reproduce  the  series ; 
and  if  he  claim  that  this  might  be  done  if  he  knew  how, 
we  ask  him  to  reproduce  the  series  bacJ^ivards.     What 
the  biologists  need  to  do  is  to  recognize  the  limitations 
of  one  method,  and  the  justification  of  the  other  in  its 


GENETIC  EVOLUTIONISM  223 

own  province.  In  the  life  processes  there  seems  to  be  a 
real  genetic  series,  an  irreversible  series.  Each  stage 
exhibits  a  new  form  of  organization.  After  it  has  hap- 
pened, it  is  quite  competent  to  show,  by  the  formulas  of 
chemistry  and  physics,  that  the  organization  is  pos- 
sible and  legitimate.  Yet  it  is  only  by  actual  observa- 
tion and  description  of  the  facts  in  the  development  of 
the  organism,  that  the  progress  of  the  life  principle  can 
be  made  out.  The  former  is  quantitative  and  analytic 
science;  the  latter  is  genetic  science. 

We  leave  Baldwin's  Development  and  Evolution 
at  that  informing  doctrine  of  irreversibility  which  has 
been  expressly  utilized  by  the  author  of  Creative  Evo- 
lution. This  utilization  is  significant,  yet  the  Ameri- 
can's work  is  valuable  not  only  as  furnishing  a  link  be- 
tween the  English  and  French  conceptions  of  evolu- 
tion, but  also  as  a  refutation  of  the  charge  of  the  deca- 
dence of  Darwinism.  That  refutation  is  carried  on  more 
fully  in  the  subsequent  book  entitled  Darwin  atid  the 
Humanities.  Originating  as  a  contribution  to  the  Dar- 
winian celebration  of  the  American  Philosophical  As- 
sociation in  1909,  this  work  traces  the  influence  of  Dar- 
win in  the  science  of  mind,  the  humanities  broadly 
defined.  As  the  result  of  his  labors  for  twenty-five 
years  the  author  comes  to  the  conclusion  that  natural 
selection  is  in  principle  the  universal  law  of  genetic 
organization  and  progress  in  nature.  As  applied  to  the 
first  of  the  sciences  of  the  mind,  psychology,  the  Dar- 
winian factors  are  found  most  effective.  If,  that  is,  a 
selection  of  processes  and  habits  goes  on  within  the 
organism — a  functional  selection  resulting  in  a  real 
molding  of  the  individual— there  may  be  at  cver>'  stage 
of  growth  a  combination  of  genetic  characters  with  ac- 
quired  modifications.      Then,    natural   selection   would 


224  EVOLUTIONISM 

fall  in  each  case  upon  this  joint  or  correlated  result. 
The  organisms  showing  the  most  effective  combinations 
would  survive.  Put  in  psychological  terms  this  means: 
Give  the  animal  a  little  sense — a  grain  of  the  capacity 
to  profit  by  experience,  to  imitate,  to  cooperate,  to  de- 
ceive, to  remember  and  distinguish  what  is  good  for  it 
from  what  is  bad — a  bit  of  intelligence,  broadly  under- 
stood, and  he  is  started  on  the  career  of  learning  in 
comparison  with  which  his  earlier  achievements  become 
quite  insignificant.  If,  in  short,  we  are  to  allow  that 
accommodative  or  learning  processes  of  whatever  kind  do 
have  any  infiuence,  however  indirect,  on  the  course  of 
evolution,  then  that  prime,  that  superb  weapon  of  learn- 
ing, mind,  comes  to  its  own  and  starts  upon  its  splendid 
career.  But  if  this  be  so,  if  mind  be  natural  and  also 
useful,  then  we  are  still  of  course  within  the  Darwin- 
ian circle  of  ideas.  "Why  are  not  mental  faculties  and 
functions  to  be  considered  characters  which  have  been 
evolved  by  selection  for  their  utility?  Darwin  held 
this  in  his  Descent  of  Man.  But  instead  of  the  desul- 
tory recognition  of  the  place  and  effectiveness  of  mental 
states  in  a  theory  dealing  mainly  with  the  physical,  we 
now  see  the  universal  principle  of  the  relation  of  mental 
to  organic  evolution.  Mind  is  correlated  with  plasticity, 
its  evolution  with  that  of  brain  and  nerves.  The  his- 
tory of  the  evolution  of  these  organs  is  also  that  of  the 
evolution  of  mind.  In  this  we  have  the  next  great  step 
in  which  biology  and  psychology  join  hands  in  a  safe 
and  accomplished  generalization:  that  of  the  correla- 
tion of  nervous  plasticity  with  mind,  of  "  educability  " 
with  "  sense." 

The  force  of  this,  for  our  present  purpose,  is  this: 
plasticity  is  a  real  character,  a  character  the  opposite 
of  fixity.     It  is  opposed  even  to  the  potential  sort  of 


GENETIC  EVOLUTIONISM  225 

fixity  assumed  by  preformism — the  theory  that  all  sub- 
sequent adjustments  are  already  present  potentially  in 
the  germ.  It  leaves  to  the  organism  genuine  alterna- 
tives ;  genuine  novelties  of  adjustment  are  possible.  And 
consciousness,  intelligence,  is  also  a  real  character,  cor- 
related with  plasticity.  Both  are  present  together,  how- 
ever we  may  account  for  it;  and  both  have  been  advanced 
for  their  utility,  as  Darwin's  hypothesis  requires.  This 
is  especially  seen  in  the  "  new  "  logic,  where  the  theory 
of  truth  becomes  either  one  of  extreme  "  Pragmatism  " 
or  one  merely  of  "  Instrumentalism."  Instrumentalism 
holds  that  all  truth  is  tentatively  arrived  at  and  experi- 
mentally verified.  The  method  of  knowledge  is  the  now 
familiar  Darwinian  procedure  of  "  trial  and  error." 
The  thinker,  wiiether  working  in  the  laboratory  with 
things  or  among  the  products  of  his  own  imaginative 
thought,  tries  out  liypothcses;  and  only  by  trying  out 
hypotheses  does  he  establish  truth.  The  knowledge  al- 
ready possessed  is  used  "  instrumentally  "  in  the  form 
of  a  hypothesis  or  conjecture,  for  the  discovery  of  fur- 
ther facts  or  truths.  This  reinstates  in  the  sphere  of 
thinking  the  method  of  Darwinian  selection. 

It  is  in  his  application  to  philosophy  that  Baldwin 
brings  out  some  of  the  most  telling  results  of  Darwinism. 
He  illustrates  this  in  that  summary  chapter  which  be- 
gins with  psychology  and  ends  with  religion.  Psychol- 
ogy, he  tells  us,  has  always  been  the  vestibule,  as  it  were, 
to  philosophy,  and  advance  in  the  latter  never  gets  far 
beyond  that  of  the  former.  So  when  psychology  adopted 
seriously  a  naturalistic  and  positivistic  method — the 
method,  that  is,  of  the  positive  sciences  of  nature — 
philosophy  had  also  to  recognize  the  generality'  of  these 
points  of  view.  Philosophical  truth,  like  all  other  truth, 
must  be  looked  upon  as  truth  about  nature — the  nature 


226  EVOLUTIONISM 

ol"  the  world  and  the  nature  of  man — and  its  progress  is 
secured  through  reflection  exercised  under  the  control 
of  the  positive  instruments  and  methods  emploj^ed  in 
those  subjects.  Purely  deductive,  speculative  and  per- 
sonal systems  of  philosophy  may  be  useful  as  gymnastics 
and  profitable  as  sources  of  individual  fame ;  but  the 
genuine  progress  of  philosophy  is  to  be  looked  for  only 
through  those  methods  of  confirmation  and  proof  which 
control  the  imagination  and  permanently  satisfy  the 
logical  and  other  demands  of  common  reflection.  There 
may  be  different  philosophies,  but,  like  rival  scientific 
hypotheses,  each  must  show  the  array  of  facts,  aims, 
motives,  values,  that  it  can  explain  better  than  any 
other.  Philosophy  is  not  an  exercise  of  preference,  but 
an  exercise  of  reason ! 

In  these  directions,  continues  the  author,  Darwin  has 
strongly  influenced  modern  philosophical  thought ;  so 
strong!}'-  that  the  historical  issues  of  philosophy  have 
taken  on  new  forms,  which,  in  the  new  names  now  in 
vogue  to  describe  them,  are  unfamiliar  to  the  old-school 
philosophers.  Instead  of  the  problem  of  "  design,"  we 
now  have  the  discussions  of  "  teleology  ";  instead  of 
the  doctrine  of  "  chance,"  we  now  have  the  "  theory 
of  probabilities  ";  instead  of  "  fatalism  "  and  "  free- 
dom," we  now  have  "  determininism  "  and  "  indeter- 
minism,"  variously  qualified;  instead  of  "  God,"  we 
hear  of  "absolute  experience";  instead  of  "Provi- 
dence," of  "  order  "  and  "  law  "  ;  instead  of  "  mind 
and  body,"  of  "  dualism  or  monism."  Not  that  all  this 
shifting  of  emphasis  and  change  of  terms  are  due  to 
Darwin ;  but  that  they  are  incidents  of  the  newer  antith- 
eses current  since  the  mind  has  been  considered  as  sub- 
ject to  "  natural  law,"  and  the  world,  including  God 
and  man,  as  common  material  for  science  to  investi- 


GENETIC  EVOLUTIONISM  227 

gate.     Scientific  naturalism  and  positivism  are  methods 
of  unlimited  scope;  and  the  question  of  philosophy  is. 
what  does  the  whole  system  of  things,  of  external  facts 
and  of  human  values  alike — when  thus  investigated — 
really  turn  out  to  mean?    So  design  may  be  illustrated 
by  considering  more  fully  a  central  problem — one  com- 
mon to  biologj'  and  psychology  alike,  and  one  whose 
answer  colors  the  whole  of  one's  philosophy.    It  is  the 
old   problem  of  "  design,"   giving   rise   in   biology   to 
theories  of  "  special  creation  "  and  "  chance,"  and  now 
discussed,  alike  in  biologj'  and  psychology,  in  the  form 
of  questions  of  "  vitalism  "  and  "  teleology."    In  what 
sense,  if  any,  is  the  world — and  in  it,  life  and  mind — 
an  ordered,  progressive,  and  intelligible  whole?     And 
if  it  is  such  in  any  sense,  how  did  it  become  so?     Is  it 
due  to  intelligence  ? — and  if  so,  whose  intelligence  ?    The 
most  violent  controversies  aroused  by  the   publication 
of  the  Origin  of  Species  were  let  loose  about  this  ques- 
tion.    To  Darwin's  opponents  "  chance,"  "  fortuitous 
or  spontaneous  variation,"   was  to  take  the   place   of 
intelligent  creation.  Providence,  God.     If  there  be  no 
rule  of  selection  and  survival  save  that  of  utility,  and  no 
source  of  the  useful  save  the  overproduction  of  chance 
cases,  where  is  the  Guiding  Hand?     Does  not  Natural 
Selection  dispense  with  a  ruling  Intelligence  altogether? 
We  have  only  to  understand  the  present-day  statement 
of  this  problem,  explains  Baldwin,  to  see  the  enonnous 
concession  to  naturalism  which  the  theory-  of  Darwin  has 
forced.    Instead  of  "  chance  "  in  the  sense  of  uncaused 
accident,  we  now  have  the  notion  of  "  probability,"  a 
mathematically  exact  interpretation  of  what  is  only  to 
superficial  observation  fortuitous  and  capricious;  instead 
of  an  interfering  Providence,  we  have  universal  order 
bom  of  natural  law.    And  it  is  within  such  conceptions 


228  EVOLUTIONISM 

as  these,  )ww  taJxcn  as  common  ground  of  argument,  that 
the  discussion  of  teleology  is  conducted.  The  world  is 
no  longer  thought  of  as  a  piece  of  mosaic  work  put  to- 
gether by  a  skillful  artificer — as  the  old  design  theory 
looked  upon  it — but  as  a  whole,  a  cosmos,  of  law-abiding 
and  progressive  change.  A  philosopher  who  knows  his 
calling  to-day  seeks  to  interpret  natural  law,  not  to  dis- 
cover violations  of  it.  The  violations,  if  they  came, 
would  reduce  the  world  to  caprice,  chance,  and  chaos, 
instead  of  providing  a  relief  from  these  things. 

So  Darwin's  view,  argues  the  author,  while  adminis- 
tering a  coup  de  grace  to  theories  of  chance  and  special 
creation,  both  equally  desultory,  capricious,  and  lawless, 
replaced  them  once  for  all  with  law.  It  indicated  the 
method  of  operation  by  which  the  progressive  forms  of 
nature  are  evolved  in  stages  more  and  more  ordered  and 
fit.  The  operation  of  such  a  law  is  no  less  and  no  more 
"  rational,"  no  less  and  no  more  "  fatalistic,"  no  less 
and  no  more  "  atheistic,"  than  is  that  of  any  other 
law,  physical  or  mental.  What  law — meaning  simply 
what  regular  method  of  change — is  operative  in  nature  ? 
and  what  is  its  range,  as  compared  with  other  such  laws  ? 
— these  are  questions  entirely  of  fact,  to  be  determined 
by  scientific  investigation.  And  how  far  the  method 
or  law  called  by  Darwin  "  natural  selection  "  goes,  what 
its  range  really  is,  we  are  now  beginning  to  see  in  its 
varied  applications  in  the  sciences  of  life  and  mind.  It 
seems  to  be — unless  future  investigations  set  positive 
limits  to  its  application — a  universal  principle ;  for  the 
intelligence  itself,  in  its  procedure  of  tentative  experi- 
mentation, or  "  trial  and  error,"  appears  to  operate 
in  accordance  with  it. 


CHAPTER  VIII 
MODERN  IDEALISM 

1.   The  German  Influences 

It  is  hard  to  measure  the  intangible  and  to  weigh  the 
immaterial,  yet  it  may  safely  be  said  that  the  German 
influences  on  American  thought  hMvp.mGim— the  most 
significant  and  themost  weighty  j3i_-alL  the  foreign 
forces.  In  the  words~6f  one  ofour  German- American 
lecturers  this  state  of  affairs  is  due,  in  large  measure, 
to  the  after-effect  of  that  great  epoch  of  German  human-  y 

ism  signalized  by  the  names  of  Goethe  and  Kant,  Schiller^ 
and  Fichte.  The  very  substance  of  the  life-work  of 
these  men  and  their  compeers  consisted  in  this,  that  they 
replaced  the  ecclesiastical  doctrine  of  atonejnent  by  the'j 
belfefTn  the  saving  quaTTtyof  restless  striving.  Never 
in  the  wEole'history  oFthe  world  has  there  been  held  up 
to  man  an  ideal  of  life  more  exalted,  more  inspiring, 
freer  from  unworthy  or  belittling  motives  than  their 
teachings.  They  trusted  in  the  essential  goodness  of  all 
life ;  they  conceived  of  theguniverse  as  a  great  spiritual 
beingj,iingag€d-i»  -een&tantrs?l|:^^l?ti^^^~^'"^  ^°  ^  ^°°" 
staiit  struggle  toward  higher  forms  of  existence.  JEligy 
believed  that  man,  as  a^part  of-  this  spiigtual  universe, 
was  in  imroe^ate  and  instinctive  communication  with 
its  imiefmiQsilfissence;  and  they  saw  the  great  office  of 
nian  in  helping  the  spirit  toward  its  fullest  self-realiza- 
tion. 

The  German  humanism,  as  thus  described  by  Kuno 
229 


230  MODERN  IDEALISM 

Francke,  has  indeed  had  great  influence  upon  our  ways 
of  thinking.  The  proof  of  that  lies  in  the  very  famil- 
iarity of  its  doctrines.  But  that  influence  and  that 
familiarity  were  not  matters  of  an  instant.  It  took 
many  years  and  many  men  to  accomplish  the  result. 
There  were  in  the  way  great  difficulties,  due  to  race,  so- 
cial conditions,  and  language.  The  first  flight  of  Teu- 
tonic immigrants  began  with  the  wretched  refugees  of 
the  Thirty  Years'  War,  and  ended  about  the  time  of 
the  adoption  of  our  Constitution.  Previous  to  1789  it 
was  predominantly  the  peasant  classes  that  came  into 
the  country.  But  among  such  farmers  as  were  repre- 
sented by  the  Pennsylvania  "  Dutch  "  one  could  not 
hope  to  find  regular  philosophers.  There  were  indeed 
mystics  like  Conrad  Beissel  and  his  Ephrata  community, 
but  their  theosophy  had  slight  influence  and  remained 
as  little  appreciated  as  did  the  architecture  of  the 
brotherhood  buildings  and  the  music  of  its  inmates. 

Except  for  a  slight  infiltration  of  Protestant  sectaries 
'like  the  Lutherans,  with  one  or  two  scholars  of  local 
note,  the  next  flight  of  immigrants  was  delayed  for  over 
half  a  century.  But  with  the  Refugees  of  '48  there  came 
in  both  blood  and  brains.  Men  like  Hecker  and  Koerner, 
Schurz  and  Sigel,  fleeing  from  the  reactionary  militar- 
ism of  the  Fatherland,  sought  to  found  a  new  Germany 
in  the  new  West.  This  group,  and  others  of  Germanic 
origin,  made  possible  the  St.  Louis  school  and  furnished 
the  nucleus  of  those  audiences  which  listened  to  the 
diluted  transcendentalism  of  Emerson  and  Alcott. 

That  transcendentalism  was  indeed  diluted,  for  it  was 
a  very  much  modified  German  philosophy  which  first 
excited  attention  in  the  country.  James  Murdock 
of  Yale  College,  the  neglected  historian  of  the  move- 
ment, explains  how  Coleridge,  being  a  poet  more  than  a 


THE  GERMAN  INFLUENCES  231 

philosopher,  obscured,  if  ho  did  not  pervert  understand- 
ing of  the  genuine  tenets  of  Kant.  Tiic  Aids  io  Keflcc- 
iion  were  indeed  republished  in  New  England  as  early 
as  1829,  but  they  were  an  aid  to  the  rhapsodists  ratlier 
than  to  the  cautious  thinkers.  Now,  most  Americans  at 
this  time  were  of  the  latter  conservative  type.  While  they 
belonged  to  the  empirical  school  and  were  "  slow,  cau- 
tious, dubitating,  and  modest,"  the  Germans  belonged 
to  the  metaphysical  and  were  "  daring,  bold,  and  self- 
confident."  Besides  these  temperamental  differences 
there  were  other  difficulties.  Such  was  the  novelty  of 
the  principles  of  Kant  and  so  strange  was  the  termin- 
ology that  another  writer  speaks  of  the  absurdity  of 
offering  for  the  edification  of  sober,  matter-of-fact  Anglo- 
Saxons  the  unintelligible  idealism  of  Kant,  Fichte,  and 
Schelling. 

To  the  hostile  mental  attitude  there  were  added  ma- 
terial difficulties.  George  Ticknor,  wishing  to  prepare 
himself  for  his  trip  to  Goettingen,  had  to  send  to  New 
Hampshire  for  a  German  dictionary,  while  a  Geniian 
grammar  was  hard  to  find  in  all  New  England.  But — ; 
perhaps  the  greatest  obstruction  to  the  free  importation 
of  foreign  ideas  was  the  servile  deference  to  English 
judgment  and  the  consequent  embargo  upon  the  intel- 
lectual goods  of  other  nations.  Intellectually  New  Eng-_ 
land  was  as  yet  a  colony  of  Old  England,  and  the  per- 
nicious interdiction  of  metaphysical  trade  with  other 
countries  still  obtained.  This  can  be  illustrated  by  the 
early  native  accounts  of  the  Kantian  philosophy.  Dis- 
regarding some  hack-writer's  version  in  the  first  Ameri- 
can reprint  of  that  Noah's  Ark  of  all  knowledge — the 
Encydopcedia  Britannica — we  turn  to  the  notice  given 
by  Samuel  Miller  in  his  Retrospect  of  the  Eighteenth 
Century.    This  is  not  so  much  a  notice  as  a  slander,  and 


232  MODERN  IDEALISM 

yet  the  author  is  hardly  liable,  since  he  obtained  his 
information  at  third  hand.  Miller  quotes  from  a  London 
reviewer  of  an  English  translation  of  a  German  criticism 
of  the  critical  philosophy.  With  no  direct  knowledge 
of  the  original  he  repeats  the  stale  strictures  upon  the 
great  thinker  of  Koenigsberg:  Kant  is  guilty  of  indefi- 
nite evasions  because  his  system  is  neither  deism  nor 
materialism,  libertinism  nor  fatalism;  he  has  studied  to 
envelop  his  system  in  an  enigmatic  language  because  that 
system  tends  to  undermine  all  religion  and  morals; — 
in  short,  the  famous  Prussian's  theoretical  jargon,  in- 
stead of  being  calculated  to  advance  science,  or  to  for- 
ward human  improvements,  has  rather  a  tendency  to 
delude,  to  bewilder,  and  to  shed  a  baneful  influence  on 
the  true  interests  of  man. 

This  so-called  first  notice  of  the  Kantian  philosophy 
in  America  has  been  styled  by  the  Germans  a  piece  of 
comical  naivete.  Nevertheless  that  naivete  can  be  under- 
stood. Miller  in  his  Retrospect  was  merely  a  watch-dog 
of  orthodoxy.  When  other  dogs  barked  he  joined  in 
the  cry  of  alarm.  To  him,  as  a  follower  of  the  Scotch 
philosophy,  realism  was  the  most  rational,  idealism  the 
most  absurd  of  schemes.  A  more  sympathetic  attitude 
towards  the  Continental  system  is  found  in  Philadelphia 
and  among  certain  Pennsylvanians  of  German  origin. 
In  the  Philadelphia  Monthly  Magazine  of  1798  we  find 
the  earliest  discovered  notice  of  Kant  on  this  side  of 
the  water.  Taken  largely  from  Lange  it  has  some  sensible 
and  sympathetic  remarks  on  the  new  philosophy.  As 
this  philosophy  has  considerably  excited  the  curiosity 
of  the  learned  in  Europe,  the  compiler  hopes  that  his 
sketch  will  prove  acceptable  to  his  readers.  The  gist  of 
this  sketch  is  as  follows:  It  forms  the  chief  business  of 
the  Criterion  of  Pure  Reason,  by  measuring  and  ascer- 


THE  GERMAN  INFLUENCES  233 

taining  the  limits  of  our  different  faculties,  to  exhibit 
a  complete  and  distinct  system  of  all  our  means  of  ac- 
quiring knowledge.  Now,  since  it  is  only  by  apprehen- 
sion in  this  our  pure  form,  that  anything  becomes  an 
object  of  science,  knowledge  thus  acquired  is  the  only 
kind  of  knowledge  which  can  properly  be  called  ob- 
jective; while  knowledge  of  every  other  kind  is  called 
subjective.  To  show  the  value  of  the  former  is  the  aim 
of  the  Criterion  of  Pure  Reason.  Kant,  as  has  been  said, 
distinguishes  between  2^"''c  and  practical  Self.  That 
part  of  our  idea  which  does  not  proceed  from  the  thing 
observed,  but  from  accidental  association  subsisting  in 
our  mind,  is  referred  to  the  practical  Self;  and  it  is 
precisely  this  part  of  our  idea  which  is  subjective. 
When  we  have  once  learnt  what  portion  of  the  idea  is 
objective,  it  requires  only  to  separate  that  \vith  accu- 
racy, and  whatever  remains  is  subjective.  In  this  way 
we  get  clear  of  that  portion  of  our  subjective  knowledge 
which  is  occasioned  by  incorrect  observations  and  con- 
elusions.  It  is  true,  that  inasmuch  as  the  nature  of  the 
affection  of  the  mind  depends  upon  the  constitution  of 
our  organs  of  perception,  it  is  practical  or  subjective 
appearance  which  we  cannot  separate,  but  this  will  not 
deceive  such  as  understand  the  rules  of  philosophizing. 
The  tolerant  tone  of  this  article  is  remarkable.  ^lore 
remarkable  is  the  conclusion  added  by  the  compiler. 
Though  the  account  was  taken  from  a  mere  note  which 
Lange  appended  to  his  German  translation  of  Stewart 's 
Elements,  the  American  editor  catches  the  drift  of  the 
critical  philosophy.  This  much  at  least,  he  adds,  will 
appear  from  this  account,  that  Kant's  great  doctrine 
is,  that  a  knowledge  of  the  human  mind  is  not  to  be  ob- 
tained by  imagining  changes  in  the  mind  itself,  but  by 
studying  the  various  phenomena  which  it  exhibits.    The 


234  MODERN  IDEALISM 

author  himself  compares  his  discovery  to  that  of  Coper- 
nicus, by  which  he  showed  that  the  phenomena  of  the 
heavenly  bodies  did  not  entitle  us  to  attribute  to  them 
the  various  cyclar  and  epicyclar  motions  of  the  Ptolemaic 
system;  that  in  truth  we  could  be  assured  of  nothing 
more  than  the  existence  of  those  bodies;  and  that  the 
different  changes  in  their  appearance  might  as  well  be 
explained  by  supposing  a  change  in  our  situation  as  by 
supposing  any  alteration  in  theirs. 

It  is  a  decided  surprise  to  discover  the  famous 
Copernican  comparison  noticed  amongst  us  only  a  few 
years  after  the  appearance  of  the  Critique  of  Pure  Rea- 
son. It  is,  however,  unfortunate  that  it  appeared  in  an 
ephemeral  journal,  in  a  place  about  to  lose  its  intellec- 
tual supremacy,  and  at  a  time  when  men  were  not  yet 
ready  to  shift  their  philosophical  point  of  view, — to  con- 
sider themselves  not  as  satellites  but  as  suns,  from  whom 
might  come  considerable  rays  of  wisdom.  It  was  left  for 
the  New  England  transcendentalists  of  a  generation 
later  to  do  this,  for  Pennsylvanians  of  German  origin 
were  not  in  a  position  to  effect  the  Copernican  revolu- 
tion in  thought.  In  our  republic  of  letters  the  Penn- 
sylvania "  Dutch  "  were  little  affected  by  the  literature 
of  the  storm  and  stress  period  and  remained  remote,  un- 
friended, melancholy,  slow.  Moreover,  the  scholars  of 
German  origin  had  their  limitations.  Men  like 
Schmucker,  professor  in  a  Gettysburg  college,  and 
Kauch,  president  of  Marshall  College,  were  not  much 
known  outside  of  their  local  Lutheran  circles.  And  so 
when  the  literary  leadership  was  shifted  from  Phila- 
delphia and  the  South  to  Boston  and  the  North,  that 
frigid  air  of  condescension  characteristic  of  New  Eng- 
land nipped  the  growth  of  the  foreign  plants.  The  head 
of  Yale  College  referred  to  Kantianism  as  subversive 


THE  GERMAN  INFLUENCES  235 

of  morality;  and  Harvard,  althougli  acecptin<];  a  present 
of  books  from  Goethe  himself,  feared  the  Germans  even 
bearing  gifts. 

There  was,  however,  one  voice  crying  in  tliis  wilderness 
of  exclusiveness.  We  refer  again  to  James  Murdock 
and  his  Sketches  of  Modern  Philosophy,  especially 
among  the  Germans.  Here  he  claims  that  the  confound- 
ing of  reason  with  understanding,  and  of  ideas  with 
conceptions  by  Locke  and  by  most  of  the  English, 
Scotch,  and  American  writers  since  (though  it  was  a 
natural  consequence  of  supposing  all  human  knowledge 
to  be  derived  from  sensations  and  reflections  on  them) 
has  spread  much  obscurity  and  confusion — and  con- 
tributed not  a  little  to  render  the  English  language  unfit 
for  clear  and  conclusive  reasoning  on  metaphysical 
subjects.  This  is  one  great  reason  why  so  many  among 
us  cannot  understand  and  appreciate  the  writings  of  the 
German  philosophers.  Their  clear,  precise,  and  definite 
thoughts,  the  moment  they  are  translated  into  English, 
become  obscure,  indefinite,  and  vague;  because  the  lan- 
guage into  which  they  are  translated  is  so.  It  is  true 
that  the  Germans  have  introduced  a  multitude  of  new 
technical  terms  into  philosophy  which  sound  veiy 
strange  in  our  ears ;  and  Kant  in  particular  has  been  cen- 
sured, even  by  his  own  countrj-men,  for  his  excessive 
coinage :  but  if  our  language  had  appropriate  terms  for 
expressing  the  more  necessary  distinctions  of  thought,  we 
might  contrive  some  way  to  avoid  the  use  of  German 
technics,  and  yet  convey  to  English  minds  the  real  views 
of  the  German  writers. 

A  notorious  instance  of  the  confusion  of  technical 
philosophic  terms  in  the  English  language  is  given  by 
Murdock  in  his  description  of  the  New  England  move- 
ment.   He  says  that  that  species  of  German  philosophy 


236  MODERN  IDEALISM 

which  has  sprung  up  among  the  Unitarian  clergy  of 
Massachusetts,  and  which  is  advocated  especially  in  a 
recent  periodical  called  the  Dial,  is  known  by  the  appel- 
lation Transcendentalism.  The  propriety,  however,  of 
the  appellation  may  be  questioned.  Kant  would  certainly 
not  apply  it  to  this  or  to  any  similar  system.  He  would 
denominate  it  transcendent,  not  transcendental.  The 
difference  according  to  his  views  is  immense.  Both 
terms  indeed  denote  the  surpassing  or  transcending  of 
certain  limits;  but  the  limits  surpassed  are  entirely  dif- 
ferent. That  is  called  transcendental  which  surpasses 
the  limits  of  sensible  or  empirical  knowledge  and  ex- 
patiates in  the  region  of  pure  thought  or  absolute  sci- 
ence. It  is,  therefore,  truly  scientific ;  and  it  serves  to 
explain  empirical  truths,  so  far  as  they  are  explicable. 
On  the  other  hand,  that  is  called  transcendent  which  not 
only  goes  beyond  empiricism,  but  surpasses  the  bound- 
aries of  human  knowledge.  It  expatiates  in  the  shad- 
owy  region  of  imaginary  truth.  It  is,  therefore,  falsely 
called  science ;  it  is  the  opposite  of  true  philosophy.  A 
balloon  sent  up  by  a  besieging  army  to  overlook  the 
ramparts  of  a  fortification,  if  moored  by  cables  whereby 
its  elevation,  its  movements,  and  its  safe  return  into 
camp  are  secured,  is  a  transcendental  thing;  but  if  cut 
loose  from  its  moorings  and  left  to  the  mercy  of  the 
winds,  it  is  transcendent;  it  has  no  connection  with 
anything  stable,  no  regulator;  it  rises  or  descends, 
moves  this  way  or  that  way  at  haphazard,  and  it  will 
land  no  one  knows  where  or  when.  Now,  according  to 
the  critical  philosophy,  all  speculations  in  physical  sci- 
ence that  attempt  to  go  beyond  phenomena,  and  all 
speculations  on  supersensible  things  which  attempt  to 
explain  their  essential  nature,  are  transcendent ;  that  is, 
they  overleap  the  boundaries  of  human  knowledge.    In 


THE  GERMAN  INFLUENCES  237 

violation  of  these  cautions,  Ficlite,  Schclling,  and  Ilcgel 
plunged  headlong  into  sueh  speculations,  and  yet  called 
them  transcendental ;  and  the  new  German  philosophers 
of  Massachusetts  follow  their  example. 

We  bring  forward  these  criticisms  for  a  purpose.  It 
is  to  show  that  the  current  confusion  of  technical  terms 
displayed  an  ignorance  of  German  philosophy  at  first 
hand.  In  other  words,  the  influence  of  that  philosophy 
had  so  far  been  indirect  rather  than  direct,  literary 
rather  than  historical.  From  abroad,  Coleridge  and 
Cousin  had  brought  in  the  romantic  stimulus,  but  it  was 
couched  in  anything  but  exact  terms.  At  home,  mem- 
bers of  the  Transcendentalist  Club  and  the  Brook  Farm- 
ers cared  more  for  free  thinking  than  for  precise  think- 
ing. Even  Ripley's  Specimens  of  Foreign  Standard 
Literature  were  utilized  more  for  the  ferment  of  reform 
than  for  accurate  information.  As  Ripley  himself  de- 
clared: We  need  a  philosophy  like  this  to  purify  and 
enlighten  our  politics,  to  consecrate  our  industry,  to 
cheer  and  elevate  society. 

We  now  come  to  the  question  of  the  time  of  transition 
from  the  indirect  to  the  direct  study  of  Kant  and  his 
followers.  Some  have  held  that  the  direct  study  began 
with  the  return  of  the  young  American  scholars  from 
Goettingen  in  the  '20s.  We  believe  that  the  change  came 
much  later.  It  was  prepared  for  by  the  various  ad- 
dresses, translations,  and  anthologies  of  the  third  decade 
of  the  century;  but  that  decade  did  not  emancipate  the 
New  England  mind,  nor  open  it  to  the  freedom  of  for- 
eign thought.  Indeed  the  year  1839  put  a  black  mark 
in  the  history  of  Harvard.  In  that  year  came  Emerson 's 
Divinity  School  Address,  which  was  denounced  by  An- 
drews Norton,  "  the  pope  of  Unitarianism,"  as  "  the  last 
form  of  infidelity."     But  worse  followed.    In  reproba- 


238  MODERN  IDEALISM 

tioii  of  the  views  expressed  in  this  address  Emerson 
himself  was  exiled  from  his  own  college  for  fully  a  gen- 
eration. 

Now,  that  generation  was  one  of  preparation,  not  of 
full  understanding.  In  the  '40s,  for  example,  a  transla- 
tion of  Fichte's  Vocation  of  the  Scholar  was  reprinted  in 
Boston,  but  this,  as  Frothingham  ironically  observed, 
excited  an  interest  among  people  who  had  neither  sym- 
pathy with  his  philosophy  nor  intelligence  to  comprehend 
it.  For  such  a  lack  of  sympathy  and  of  intelligence  we 
have  not  far  to  seek.  It  was  due  in  a  great  measure  to 
what  Santayana  so  aptly  callsthe_^enl££l  tradition,  a 
tradition  due  to  the_jinion  ofchurch-and -college,  to 
S^he  belief  that  the  teacher  must  come  to  the-defense  of 
the  faith,-  Armstrong  has  pointed  out  the  peculiar 
function  of  philosophy  in  the  ' '  old  American  college  ' ' : 
After  the  student  had  been  trained  in  the  time-honored 
classics  and  mathematics,  after  he  had  learned  his  modi- 
cum of  rhetoric  and  history  and  natural  science,  there 
remained  the  "  higher  branches,"  which  were  held  not 
only  to  train,  him.  in.  scholarship  but  to  fit  him  for  prac- 
tical life.  Political  science  would  make  him  S  good  citi- 
zeiT;  the  evidences  of  Christianity  would  ground  his  re- 
ligious faith.  Now,  these  evidences  were  bolstered  up 
by  correlated  courses  in  natural  theology,  in  mental  and 
moral  philosophy,  and  only  occasionally  in  the  history 
of  philosophy.  .  .  .  Moreover,  these  courses  were  always 
prescribed  and  generally  given  by  the  clerical  heads  of 
the  colleges. 

But  the  era  of  dogmatic  soundness  was  at  last  suc- 
(feeded  by  the  day  of  the  impartial  discussion  of  meta- 
physics. Then  came  the  transition  from  the  old  order  to 
\  the  new.  The  centennial  of  our  political  independence 
marked  the  beginnings  of  our  academic  independence. 


J    ma 


THE  GERMAN  INFLUENCES  239 

B^^  that  time  philosophy  began  to  be  studied  as  an  clcct- 
ive^and  f orTts  own  sake.    Several  causes  were  contribu- 
tory,— the  general  advance  in  higher  education,  the  em- 
pirical conclusions  poured  in  upon  us  by  the  scientists, 
and  especially  the  influence  of  the  progress  of  psycho- 
logical science.    "With  us  that  science  was  distinctly  »ft-^ 
importation  from  Germany,  and  with  the  founding  of    / 
our  first  psychological  laboratory  in  1876  there  comes  / 
a  definite  date  for  direct  German  influence — in  the  East,  / 
at  least. 

"We  make  this  qualification  because  of  a  forgotten  fac- 
tor  in   our   intellectual  history.     Two   decades  before 
German   philosophy,    diluted   with    dogma,    was    being 
taught  at  Harvard  by  Bowen,  at  Yale  by  Porter,  at 
Princeton  by  iMcCosh,  and  at  the  University  of  Pennsyl- 
vania by  Krauth, — long  before jthis,  the  pure  doctrines  of 
Kant  and  his  followers  were  being  made  familiar  in  the 
West.    This  is  one  of  the  characteristic  surprises  in  thc*^ ' 
history^of  our  culture,  that  out  of  the  new  land  comeij 
the  new  knowledge.    It  was  in  St.  Louis  that  there  cam 
into  being  the  first  Kant  class  in  America,  the  first  na 
tive  translations  of  Fichte  and  Schelling,  the  first  sys 
tematic  study  of  Hegel.    Indeed  at  the  very  period  when 
the  Massachusetts  transcendentalists  were  largely  out- 
side of  the  pale  of  the  church,  largely  out  of  sympathy 
with  the  colleges,  there  was  being  trained  in  Missouri  a 
group  of  idealists  who,  by  their  freedom  of  thinking  and 
philosophic    knowledge,    made   the    Concord__school    of 
philosophy.,£OssililiL— IJi-iifl^,-that  later  idealism,  whose 
origin  has  been  usually  a.ttributed  _to_New  England,  had 
its  impetus  elsewhere.    It  was  a  paradoxical  phenomenon. 
It  was  like  one  of  our  storms  which,  blowing  from  the 
northeast,  has  its  real  beginning  in  the  southwest.     To 
that  quarter  of  the  compass  we  now  turn. 


240  MODERN  IDEALISM 

2.    The  St.  Louis  School:  William  T.  Harris 

It  has  been  declared  a  remarkable  fact  that  in  a  boom- 
ing Western  city — almost  on  the  borders  of  civilization — 
apparently  almost  wholly  occupied  with  material  things, 
there  should  have  arisen  one  of  the  leading  schools  of 
idealism  in  America.  This  was  the  St.  Louis  school, 
which  initiated  our  first  systematic  study  of  German 
thought,  and  led  to  the  publication  of  our  first  meta- 
physical journal,  The  Journal  of  Speculative  Philosophy. 

I  The  movement  can  best  be  studied  through  the  men  who 
made  it.    These  were  three :  Brockmeyer  the  oracle,  Har- 

I   ris  the   interpreter,    and   Snider  the   historian   of  the 
Tiiovement. 

Of  this  triumvirate  Brockmeyer  is  the  most  pic- 
turesque figure.  Born  in  Germany,  coming  to  this  coun- 
try at  the  age  of  sixteen,  he  was  expelled  from  a  fresh- 
water Western  college  because  of  his  free-thinking,  and 
left  for  the  East,  where  he  became  imbued  with  the  New 
England  teachings.  But  the  fixed  social  order  not  suiting 
him  he  determined  to  become  another  Thoreau,  to  leave 
society  and  seek  solitude.  In  this  plan,  he  tells  us,  he 
had  taken  to  heart  the  advice  of  Parmenides  to  the  young 
Socrates :  "  Be  sure  to  educate  and  practice  yourself 
in  the  so-called  useless  metaphysical  hair-splitting  while 
you  are  still  young,  lest  the  truth  should  escape  you." 
So  Brockmeyer  went  West  to  the  old  hunting-ground  of 
Daniel  Boone,  there  built  himself  a  log  cabin,  and  with 
his  dog  as  his  sole  companion,  lived  for  several  years 
supporting  himself  by  hunting.  He  did  this  because 
with  his  gun  he  could  procure  in  an  hour  enough  food 
for  the  day,  and  have  the  rest  of  the  time  for  working 
out  the  thoughts  in  his  head.  This  Utopian  scheme  could 
not  last.     Therefore,  resolving  to  provide  himself  with 


THE  ST.  LOUIS  SCHOOL:  WILLIAM  T.  HARRIS     241 

a  competency  for  his  old  age,  ho  came  to  St.  Louis.  It 
was  there  in  the  year  1858  that  he  accidentally  met 
Harris,  who  describes  this  unconventional  backwoodsj 
philosopher  as  even  at  that  time  a  thinker  of  the 
same  order  of  mind  as  Hegel,  for  even  before  reading 
much  nf-tha  groat  idealist  he  had  diyjncd  his  chief 
ideas  and  the  position  of  his  system.  On  my  first  ac- 
quaintance with  him,  continues  Harris,  he  informed  me 
that  Hegel  was  the  great  man  among  modem  philoso- 
phers and  that  his  larger  Logic  was  the  work  to  get.  I 
sent  immediately  to  Germany  for  it,  and  it  arrived  lato 
in  the  year.  Mr.  Brockmeyer's  deep  insights  and  his 
poetic  power  of  setting  them  forth  with  symbols  and 
imagery  furnished  me  and  my  friends  of  those  early 
years  all  of  our  outside  stimulus  in  the  study  of  Ger- 
man philosophy.  He  impressed  us  with  the  practicality 
of  philosophy,  inasmuch  as  he  could  flash  into  the  ques- 
tions of  the  day,  and  even  into  the  questions  of  the  mo- 
ment, the  highest  insight  of  philosophy  and  solve  their 
problems.  Even  the  hunting  of  wild  turkeys  or  squirrels 
was  the  occasion  for  the  use  of  philosophy.  Philosophy 
came  to  mean  with  us.  therefore,  the  most  practical  of 
all  species  of  knowledge.  ...  We  studied  the  dialectic 
of  politics  and  political  parties  and  understood  how 
measures  and  men  might  be  combined  by  this  light. 
But  our  chief  application  of  philosophy  was  to  literature 
and  art. 

To  turn  to  Harris,  the  second  of  the  triumvirate. 
Brockmeyer  recounts  how  he  met  his  foremost  disciple 
at  a  chance  meeting  where  those  present  were  discussing 
Oriental  theosophy,  spiritualism,  or  something  of  that 
sort.  The  secretary  of  that  meeting,  he  narrates,  was  a 
young  man  named  Harris,  who  seemed  to  me  to  be  the 
one  sane  person  of  the  gathering.     After  tiic  meeting  I 


242  MODERN  IDEALISM 

accosted  him  and  began  to  question  him  as  we  walked 
along.  He  seemed  surprised  that  such  a  common  work- 
ingman,  as  I  appeared  to  be,  should  talk  in  this  way,  and 
we  got  into  a  discussion.  He  made  some  quotation  from 
Cousin,  and  I  remarked  that  Cousin  contradicted  him- 
self on  every  page.  On  his  challenging  this  statement  I 
accompanied  him  to  his  room  to  prove  it  from  Cousin's 
works.  This  was  the  beginning  of  our  friendship,  and 
the  nucleus  of  the  group  of  students  that  soon  gathered 
together. 

Here  was  the  beginning  of  the  first  systematic  study 
of  Hegel  in  the  country.  Brockmeyer  tells  how  Harris 
and  two  other  enthusiastic  young  men  wished  him  to 
cease  working  in  the  foundry  and  give  his  time  to  in- 
structing them  and  to  translating  the  great  works  of 
German  thought.  But  the  commencement  of  the  Civil 
War,  of  which  the  first  storm  center  was  Missouri,  inter- 
fered with  this  arrangement  and  broke  up  the  little  band 
of  philosophers.  Six  months  after  Appomattox  the 
philosophers  met  again.  It  was  then  that  the  third  of 
the  triumvirate  appears  upon  the  scene  and  gives  his 
impressions  of  the  other  two:  There  was  Brockmeyer, 
dishevelled  and  ragged  in  his  working  clothes,  the  un- 
doubted oracle  of  the  meeting,  who  would  forcibly  de- 
liver his  response  as  one  having  authority  and  could  even 
re-create  Hegel  by  poetizing  the  latter 's  dry,  colorless 
abstractions.  There  was  Harris,  the  active  worker  of  the 
philosophic  set,  the  eager  propagandist,  who  with  his 
sharp  face,  and  rather  pointed  nose,  could  prick  keenly 
and  deeply  into  things.  The  two  men  were  in  themselves 
an  illustration  of  the  Hegelian  dialectic,  a  contrast  and 
at  the  same  time  complementary  to  each  other, — one  the 
man  of  genius,  but  rather  indolent;  the  other  the  man 
of  talent  and  very  industrious. 


THE  ST.  LOUIS  SCHOOL:  WH.LIAM  T.  HARRIS     213 

The  man  of  talent  may  now  speak  for  liimself.  In 
one  of  our  best  philosophic  autobiographies,  Harris,  tlie 
editor  of  Hegel's  Logic,  sees  in  himself  an  illustration  of 
that  logic.  In  the  unfolding  of  his  life  there  were  three 
' '  moments  ' ' ;  the  first  a  phase  of  positivism ;  next,  a  | 
conversion  to  transcendentalism ;  and  lastly,  a  tran- 
scending of  that  transcendentalism.  While  a  student 
Yale  College,  Harris  had  taken  up  with  phrenology-  and 
the  eclecticism  of  Cousin.  This  was  what  he  called  his 
"  saurian  "  period,  when  he  was  mixed  up  with  that  vast 
swarm  of  isms  which  had  broken  loose  in  New  England, 
and,  as  Snider  says,  descended  upon  the  \Vest  in  count- 
less flights  like  Kansas  grasshoppers.  But  just  as  Harris 
rebelled  against  the  formalism  of  the  college  so  did  he 
rebel  against  this  "  nibbling  at  the  little  end  of  things." 
' '  The  -long-hairod  """^^i  nnd  shnrt-liairpd  women  ' '  who 
wished  to  refoniLllie -world-offlwmd-were  not  to  his-taste. 
He  wished  for  a  guide  out  of  the  maze.  He  found  it  in 
idealism.  He  declares  that  he  obtained  his  first  insight 
into  the  new  philosophy  in  studying  Kant's  Critique  of 
Pure  Reason.  Seeing  the  necessity  of  the  logical  in- 
ference that  the  unity  of  time  and  space  presupposes  one 
absolute  Reason, — God,  freedom,  and  immortality  seemed 
to  him  to  be  demonstrable  ever  since  that  December  even- 
ing in  1858  when  he  obtained  his  first  insight  into  the 
true  inference  from  the  transcendental  aesthetic. 

This  conversion  to  transcendentalism  took  place  in  the 
very  year  in  which  Harris  met  Brockmeyer.  The  latter 
now  began  to  declare  to  his  followers  that  they  must  go 
beyond  transcendentalism ;  that  there  was  a  greater  than 
Kant;  and  that  it  was  Hegel  who  was  the  culmination 
of  the  Gennan  philosophical  movoment.  The  practical 
Yankee  took  Brockmeyer  at  his  word ;  sent  to  Germany 
for  the  Logic  and,  with  Brockmeyer  as  oracle  and  ex- 


<n^ 


-5. 


244  MODERN  IDEALISM 

pounder,  made  a  definite  beginning  of  the  St.  Louis 
movement.  The  city  furnished  good  soil  for  the  teach- 
ings of  the  great  encyclopasdist.  At  least  in  the  eyes  of 
_the  local  thinkers  it  was  an  illustration_af  the  Hegelian 
philosophy  of  histoiy.  First,  the  time  was  propitious. 
After  the  civil  strife  between  North  and  South  the  recon- 
struction period  offered  an  example  of  the  harmonizing 
of  opposing  forces.  Next,  the  place  was  likewise  propi- 
tious. It  was  counted  co§;nopolitan  and  seemed  altogether 
different  from  any  other  city  of  the  land, — more  for- 
eign, more  un-American  in  its  conception  of  freedom. 
In  it  were  descendants,  of  the  early  French  families  that 
had  settled  there  under  Spanish  and  French  rule,  still 
retaining  strong  traces  of  the  ancestral  character.  By 
the  side  of  these  was  the  very  strong  element  of  the 
Southerners,  who  possessed  wealth,  culture,  and  polish 
of  manner,  perhaps  the  most  aristocratic  element  of  the 
city.  .  .  .  The  third  class  came  frouL-tJew  England  and 
the  Middle  States,  and  had  brought  with  them  culture, 
energy,  perseverance,  and  indomitable  will-power.  ]\Iany 
of  them  were  professional  and  business  men  who  had 
come  westward  to  better  themselves  financially.  Finally, 
political  trouble  in  the  various  German  statesJiQd  sent 
tens  of  thousands  into  the  Mississippi  Valley,  and  St. 
Louis  received  her  full  quota  of  them,  making  her,  con- 
cludes the  historian  of  the  movement,  a  Teutonic  city 
of  the  radical  type. 

In  spite  of  these  favoring  circumstances,  the  movement 
as  a  whole,  continues  the  same  author,  led  to  disappoint- 
ing results.  The  Philosophical  Society  was  intended  by 
Brockmeyer  as  a  means  for  publishing  his  translation  of 
Hegel's  larger  Logic.  But  politics  drew  him  aside  and 
it  was  only  long  after  his  death  that  the  task  was 
completed  by  others.    The  same  society  was  intended  by 


THE  ST.  LOUIS  SCHOOL:  WILLIAM  T.  HARRIS     245 

Harris  as  a  means  for  working  up  his  Journal  of  Specu- 
lative Philosophy.  In  this  periodical  Brockmoyer's  writ- 
ings proved  a  disappointment.  The  manuscript  of  the 
log-cabin  thinker  required  a  vast  deal  of  correction ;  that 
which  seemed  the  utterance  of  genius  to  his  followers 
suffered  from  a  kind  of  evaporation  in  print.  The 
Letters  on  Faust  which  sought  to  philosophize  litera- 
ture were  neither  philosophy  nor  literature.  Brock- 
meyer  could  never  get  himself  nor  his  writings  into 
shape.  Yet  the  oracle  of  the  school  had  a  mission  in 
inspiring  the  mind  of  the  school, — Harris.  How  that 
mind  developed  is  told  by  one  of  our  Hegelians  of  the 
right  wing  in  true  Teutonic  fashion.  Harris's  philo- 
sophical study  in  St.  Louis  from  1858  to  1867,  says 
Sterrett,  might  be  styled  his  Lehrjahre  or  Genesis; 
his  editing  the  Journal  of  Speculative  Philosophy  and 
his  work  in  the  Concord  school  of  philosophy  for  the 
second  period,  his  Wanderjahre  or  Exodus,  though  his 
work  in  both  of  these  spheres  ran  well  into  the  period  of 
his  mastership,  which  culminated  in  his  critical  exposi- 
tion of  his  great  master's  greatest  work,  the  Logic 
of  Hegel.  Of  this  first  stage  mention  has  been  made. 
It  began  with  the  study  of  philosophy  on  tlie  low  level 
of  phrenology,  and  ended  with  the  emergence  from  the 
toils  of  materialism  and  agnosticism  in  Harris's  criti- 
cism of  Herbert  Spencer.  This  criticism  was  sent  to 
the  North  American  Review  and  rejected  as  unreadable. 
The  rejection  had  results.  It  led  Harris  to  found  his 
own  Journal  and  to  strive,  and  with  no  little  success,  to 
make  his  exposition  of  Hegel  readable. 

With  the  founding  of  the  Journal  we  have  an  emerg- 
ence into  an  intense  idealism,  together  witli  an  attempt 
to  Americanize  that  idealism.  The  Journal's  motto, 
taken  from  Novalis,  was  this:  "  Philosophy  can  bake  no 


246  MODERN  IDEALISM 

bread;  but  she  can  procure  for  us  God,  Freedom,  and 
Immortality."  The  Journal's  preface  was  a  call  to 
found  a  true  "  American  "  type  of  speculative  philos- 
ophy. We,  as  a  people,  declared  the  editor,  buy  im- 
mense editions  of  John  Stuart  Mill,  Herbert  Spencer, 
Comte,  Hamilton,  Cousin,  and  others;  one  can  trace  the 
appropriation  and  digestion  of  their  thoughts  in  all 
the  leading  articles  of  our  reviews,  magazines,  and  books 
of  a  thoughtful  character.  If  this  is  American  philos- 
ophy, the  editor  thinks  it  may  be  very  much  elevated 
by  absorbing  and  digesting  more  refined  aliment.  It  is 
said  that  of  Herbert  Spencer's  works  nearly  twenty 
thousand  have  been  sold  in  this  country,  while  in  Eng- 
land scarcely  the  first  edition  has  been  bought.  This  is 
encouraging  for  the  American  thinker :  what  lofty  spirit- 
ual culture  may  not  become  broadly  and  firmly  rooted 
here  where  thoughtful  minds  are  so  numerous !  Let  this 
spirit  of  inquiry  once  extend  to  thinkers  like  Plato  and 
Aristotle,  Sehelling  and  Hegel — let  these  be  digested 
and  organically  reproduced — and  what  a  phalanx  of 
American  thinkers  we  may  have  to  boast  of!  For,  after 
all,  it  is  not  "  American  thought  "  so  much  as  American 
thinkers  that  we  want.  To  think,  in  the  highest  sense,  is 
to  transcend  all  natural  limits — such,  for  example,  as  na- 
tional peculiarities,  defects  in  culture,  distinctions  in 
race,  habits,  and  modes  of  living — ^to  be  universal,  so 
that  one  can  dissolve  away  the  external  hull  and  seize 
the  substance  itself.  The  peculiarities  stand  in  the  way ; 
were  it  not  for  these,  we  should  find  in  Greek  or  German 
philosophy  just  the  forms  we  ourselves  need.  Our  prov- 
ince as  Americans  is  to  rise  to  purer  forms  than  have 
hitherto  been  attained,  and  thus  speak  a  "  solvent 
word  ' '  of  more  potency  than  those  already  uttered.  If 
this  be  the  goal  we  aim  at,  it  is  evident  that  we  can  find 


THE  ST.  LOUIS  SCHOOL:  WILLIAM  T.  HARRIS     247 

no  other  means  so  well  adapted  to  rid  us  of  our  o\\ti 
idiosj'ncrasies  as  the  study  of  the  greatest  thinkers  of  all 
ages  and  all  times.  May  this  Journal  aid  such  a  con- 
summation ! 

This  declaration  has  a  trace  of  the  flamboyancy  of  the 
Middle  West.     It  led,  however,  to  certain  valuable  results. 
The  Journal  served  as  a  medium  for  the  first  appearance  -, 
in  English  of  a  large  number  of  German  productions, 
from  Fichte 's  Science  of  Ilistory  and  Hegel 's  Philosophy 
of  Art,  to  original  contributions  from  Von  Hartmann 
and  Michelet.    It  also  served  as  a  forcing-bed  for  native     '; 
philosophers,   from  idealists  like   Howison   and  Royce, 
to  Peirce,  the  father  of  pragmatism,  and  James  its  chief 
expositor.    But  the  main  function  of  the  early  numbers   / 
of  the  Journal  was  as  a  vehicle  of  Harris's  own  specula-  / 
tions.      These    are    embodied    in    his    Introduction    to^ 
Philosophy,  wherein  he  has  answered,  in  the  Hegelian  I 
way,  the  question  asked  by  the  reader  of  the  Journal: 
"  What   is   this   speculative   knowledge   of  which  you 
speak?  "    And  he  has  done  more;  he  has  re-defined  the 
objects  of  the  St.  Louis  Society  and  laid  out  the  pro- 
gramme for  the  Journars  contributors.    The  Society,  he 
explains,  was  not  founded  for  the  especial  purpose  of 
studying  Gecoian  phijosopliy'trom  ICant  fo~ncgel.  but 
to  encourage  the  study_and  development  of  speculative 
philosophy,  to  foster  an  application  of  its  results  to  ait, 
science,' an(Lxeligien;..  and  to  establish  a  philosophical 
basis  tqfihe  professions  oFIawTiue^icine,  divinity,  poli- 
tics, education,  and  literature.  .  .  .  This  is"a  large  pro- 
gramme.    It  reads  like  the  inflated  catalogue  of  one  of 
our  Western  "  universities."    Yet  in  this  very  inflation 
there    lay   concealed   one^^x^aydffiftloditu^^zcathoHcity. 
Harris  himself  was  an  apostle  of  this  spirit.     Caught 
from  the  encyclopaedic  Hegel,  he  applied  it  to  American 


MODERN  IDEALISM 

IS  and  thereby  became  one  of  the  clearest  in- 
fs  of  our  national  consciousness, 
ras  the  time  when  men's  souls  were  tried.     It 
f       was  a  period  of  reconstruction,  not  only  in  the  state 
1        but  also  in  the  church.    How  then  should  the  philosopher 
I        handle  these  paramount  issues  of  polities  and  religion? 
Harris  does  it  in  the  Hegelian  way,  by  considering  both 
sides,  recognizing  the  opposing  phases  and  aiming  at 
totality.     The  national  consciousness,  he  explains,  has 
moved  forward  on  to  a  new  platform  during  the  last 
few  years.    The  idea  underlying  our  form  of  government 
^    had  hitherto  developed  only  one  of  its  essential  phases — 
f    •  U^Tihat^  of  brittle  individualism — in  wlilch  national  unity 
^i^        seemed~^'ext"ernaTTnech"amsm,  soon  to  be  entirely  dis- 
vfe*f  i-  ^^pensed  with,  and  the  enterprise  of  the  private  man  or  of 
.^iy^  the  corporation  substituted  for  it.    Now  we  have  arrived 
at  the  consciousness  of  the  other  essential  phase,  and 
each   individual  recognizes  his   substantial   side   to  be 
,    the  state  as  such.    The  freedom  of  the  citizen  does  not 
I    consist  in  the  mere  arbitrary,  but  in  the  realization  of 
the  rational  conviction  which  finds  expression  in  estab- 
lished law.    That  this  new  phase  of  national  life  demands 
0  be  digested  and  comprehended,  is  a  further  occasion 
for  the  cultivation  of  the  speculative. 

So  much  for  politics.  In  regard  to  religion  Harris 
sees  an  immense  movement  going  on  in  this  country.  The 
tendency  to  break  with  the  traditional,  and  to  accept 
only  what  bears  for  the  soul  its  own  justification,  is 
widely  active,  and  can  end  only  in  the  demand  that  rea- 
son shall  find  and  establish  a  philosophical  basis  for 
all  those  great  ideas  which  are  taught  as  religious 
dogmas.  Thus  it  is  that  side  by  side  with  the  naturalism 
of  such  men  as  Renan,  a  school  of  mystics  is  beginning 
to  spring  up  who  prefer  to  ignore  utterly  all  historical 


THE  ST.  LOUIS  SCHOOL:  WILLIAM  T.  HARRIS     219 

wrappages,  and  cleave  only  to  the  speculative  kernel 
itself.  The  vortex  between  the  traditional  faith  and 
the  intellectual  conviction  cannot  be  closed  by  renounc- 
ing the  latter,  but  only  by  deepening  it  to  speculative 
insight. 

The  speculative  insight  for  which  Harris  longed  was 
given,  in  fullest  measure,  by  that  traveling  priest  of  Neo- 
Platonic  transcendentalism — Bronson  Alcott,  who  was 
now  invited  to  St.  Louis,  his  farthest  limit  west.  Al- 
cott 's  influence  in  philosophy,  declares  Harris,  was  great, 
and  his  presence  a  powerful  influence  to  stir  into  activity 
whatever  philosophical  thought  there  might  be  in  a  place. 
All  people  entering  upon  the  stage  of  the  "  clearing  up," 
or  the  intellectual  declaration  of  independence,  felt 
something  congenial  in  the  atmosphere  of  such  a  "  con- 
versation "  as  he  conducted.  The  idea  of  Neo-PlatonisT! 
is  so  negative  to  our  civilization  that  Mr.  Alcott  could 
hospitably  entertain  the  thoughts  of  any  come-outer,  and 
offer  him,  in  return,  very  surprising  viewspth«t  flowed 
naturally  enough  from  the  theory  of  "  lapse,"  but  were 
found  altogether  "  occult  "  by  the  modern  sense  that 
holds  to  the  doctrines  of  evolution  and  progress.  It 
was  perhaps  difficult  for  those  who  attended  the  convei 
sations  to  name  any  one  valuable  idea  or  insight  which 
they  had  gained  there,  but  they  felt  harmoniously  at- 
tracted to  free-thinking,  and  there  was  a  feeling  that 
great  stores  of  insight  lay  beyond  what  they  had  already 
attained.  That  a  person  has  within  him  the  power  of 
growth  in  insight,  is  the  most  valuable  conviction  that 
he  can  acquire.  Certainly  this  was  the  fruit  of  Mr. 
Alcott 's  labors  in  the  West.  Ordinarily  a  person  looks 
upon  his  ovm  wit  as  a  fixed  quantity,  and  does  not  try 
a  second  time  to  understand  anything  found  too  <lifficult 
on  the  first  trial.    Alcott  set  people  to  reading  Emerson 


250  MODERN  IDEALISM 

and  Thorcau.  He  familiarized  them  with  the  names  of 
Plato  and  Pythagoras  as  great  thinkers  whose  ideas  are 
valid  now  and  to  remain  valid  throughout  the  ages.  The 
shallowness  of  the  American  is  due  to  the  hard-and-fast 
hold  he  has  upon  his  knowledge  of  material  or  ph^'sical 
ways  and  means.  He  is  engaged  primarily  in  the  con- 
quest of  nature  for  the  uses  of  civilization,  and  his  in- 
tellectual energies  are  so  fully  occupied  with  this  busi- 
ness that  he  has  not  explored  the  width  and  depth  of 
the  civilization  for  which  he  is  producing  the  wealth. 
Thus  it  happens  that  American  thought  has  for  other 
nations  a  flavor  of  Philistinism.  It  is  narrow  and  shal- 
low. The  spiritual  heavens  are  shrunk  to  the  dimensions 
of  a  single  horizon.  There  is  no  intimation  that  the 
American  Philistine  ever  heard  of  any  other  point  of 
view  than  his  own.  He  has  heard  of  different  manners 
and  customs,  but  all  these  are  for  him  utterl}^  irrational 
and  without  adequate  motives.  He  believes  that  his 
form  of  democracy  is  the  only  form  of  government  fitted 
for  all  mankind,  and  he  wonders  that  all  people  do  not 
at  once  adopt  it,  just  as  he  has  done.  .  .  .  Failing  to  un- 
derstand contemporary  peoples,  as  the  average  American 
consciousness  does,  it  is  not  surprising  that  there  is 
a  still  w^orse  defect  in  regard  to  the  views  of  the  world 
formed  by  the  Greeks  and  Romans,  the  Persians  and 
the  Brahmins.  It  has  been,  therefore,  a  thing  needed 
that  we  should  have  reproduced  among  us,  after  a  hot- 
house mode,  the  ideas  of  other  times  and  peoples  that 
have  performed  their  part  in  the  long  march  of  civiliza- 
tion. We  have  to  learn  the  embrj^ology  of  our  civiliza- 
tion, and  see  the  necessity  for  those  stages  which  have 
been  outworn,  and  comprehend  what  was  of  value,  and 
what  is  still  of  value  in  them.  The  East  Indian  litera- 
ture, the  Chinese,  the  Persian,  and  especially  the  Egyp- 


THE  ST.  LOUIS  SCHOOL:  WILLIAM  T.  HARRIS     251 

tian,  all  shall  ho  l)rou<?ht  near  to  ns;.  and  our  minds 
endlessly  enriched  by  their  lessons.  Instead  of  our  little 
barred  window,  which  lets  in  a  glimmer  of  light  at  the 
top  of  our  cell,  we  shall  then  pro  forth  into  the  free  air, 
and  contemplate  the  entire  sky  and  all  its  light.  We  shall 
then  for  the  first  time  see  the  real  significance  of  our 
own  work  as  founders  of  a  new  nation  in  a  new  world. 
We  have  given  this  remarkable  passage  at  length  for 
two  reasons.  In  the  first  place,  it  illustrates  Harris's 
skillful  use  of  the  Hegelian  necessity  of  negativity.  In 
his  OrpJiic  Sayings  Alcott  presented,  as  we  have  seen, 
the  Neo-Platonic  view  of  the  world,  and  thus  gave  to  his 
contemporaries  the  shock  they  needed.  This  is  evident 
by  the  uproar  of  ridicule  and  indignation  which  ensued. 
American  common-sense  and  Fourth-of-July  democracy 
liad  never  considered  the  possibility  of  any  other  view 
of  the  world  than  its  own.  In  the  next  place,  the  pas- 
sage illustrates  Harris's  understanding  of  what  he  calls 
the  morphology  of  our  civilization  and  the  significance 
of  the  embryology  of  the  transcendental  movement. 
W^hile  the  most  of  the  men  of  our  time,  he  continues, 
despise  the  ''  embryons  "  which  had  developed  into 
their  present  life,  to  one  man — the  wisest  of  his  genera- 
tion— this  was  an  opportunity  not  to  be  neglected.  That 
man  was  Emerson.  He  could  find  much  sympathy  with 
any  and  all  idealistic  views — whether  European  or 
Asiatic.  Even  the  unrelenting  theory  of  the  Brahmins, 
which  makes  all  existence  an  illusion,  had  its  poetic  uses 
for  him.  .  ,  .  Emerson  kept  this  stalwart  form  of 
idealism  as  a  sort  of  medicine  which  he  could  produce 
on  occasions  when  confronted  with  the  Gorgon  of  ma- 
terialism in  any  new  .shape :  What  do  I  care,  he  exclaims, 
for  the  iron  mills,  or  the  slums  of  cities,  or  the  cholera, 
or  the  Fugitive  Slave  Law,  or  some  traveling  crank. 


252  MODERN  IDEALISM 

when  I  can  see  that  all  in  time  and  space  is  only  may  a, 
or  illusion? 

From  these  passages  we  are  justified  in  putting  a 
high  estimate  upon  the  head  of  the  St.  Louis  school.  As 
Emerson  was  the  interpreter  of  nature,  so  may  we  claim 
for  Harris  the  title  of  the  interpreter  of  the  thought  of 
his  country,  whether  East  or  AVest.  At  this  point  we 
return  to  a  previous  suggestion  regarding  that  confluence 
of  currents  which  resulted  in  the  Concord  school.  In 
that  school  Harris  was  a  notable  figure.  To  it  he  brought 
two  things,  enthusiasm  and  executive  ability.  The 
'*  philosophic  fury  "  of  his  youth  had  not  yet  died  down ; 
in  addition  he  possessed  what  he  liked  to  consider  a 
marked  characteristic  of  the  American — "  directive 
force."  Through  these  two  factors  there  was  now 
brought  together  a  notable  gathering  of  native  philoso- 
phers. The  dean  of  the  school  was  the  fiery-eyed  Alcott, 
through  whom  had  come  the  day  of  some  really  radical 
thinking.  The  secretary  of  the  school  was  Sanborn, 
who  was  to  give  us  our  first  brief  glimpse  of  the  history 
of  speculation  in  America.  This  included  the  Puritanic 
philosophy  of  Edwards,  the  philanthropic  philosophy 
of  Franklin,  the  negation  of  philosophy  (the  period  of 
deadening  realistic  dogmatism),  and  the  ideal  or  vital 
philosophy  of  Emerson.  Now,  Emerson,  though  still 
living,  was  practically  canonized  as  the  Sage  of  Con- 
cord. Men  really  looked  upon  him  as  the  great  repre- 
,,  sentative  of  our  early  national  period,  when,  as  Sanborn 
i  says,  philosophy  indicated  the  guide  of  life,  the  exponent 
•  and  directress  of  national  existence,  rather  than  a  cer- 
yjj  j  tain  metaphysical  insight,  fruitful  of  speculation,  even 
^   jA\_.^^^^  barren  of  results. 

V.V  '  But  the  times  had  changed.  ..After  the  Civil  War  there 

f      ^U    ^^'^ivecT  a  speculative  stage.     The  interest  in  abolition 

f        ■'~~-      ~  ■       


r 


THE  ST.  LOUIS  SCHOOL:  WILLIAM  T.  HARRIS     253 

was  supplanted  by  an  interest  in  the  Absolute.    Under  J  ^    / 
the  German  influenees  there  arose  the  aim  of  thought  for  ^  ■     i 
thought's  sake;  the  new  generation  was  enamored  of     l^  -^^ 
metaphysical  subtlety  and  cultivated  an  air  of  detach-     ^iJJ^ 
meut.    The  change  was  one  both  of  method  and  of  spirit  *  J 
and  the  programme  of  the  Concord  school  is  an  index  of 
that  change.     For  example,  Harris  offers  four  lectures 
on  Elementary  Insights  in  Philosophy  and  four  more  on 
Space  and  Time;  Causality  and  Self-Cause;  Faith  and 
Freedom ;  and  Categories  of  Being.   Nevertheless  an  audi-" 
ence  from  the  land  of  practicality  could  not  give  itself 
entirely  uplb  such  abstract  speculations,  nor  make  an  un- 
conditional surrender  to  the  unconditioned.  So  alongside 
of  Harris's  special  subjects,  such  as  The  Absolute  as  a 
Personal  Reason,  and  The  World  as  Revelation  of  the 
Divine  First  Cause,  we  find  those  of  another  complexion. 
If  Harris  aimed  toward  monism,  Ilowison  represented  the 
other  wing  of  Kantian  idealism;  while  James's  lectures 
on  psychology  contained  certain  pluralistic  germs  which 
were  bound  to  upset  any  system  liroasting  of-it^  stability. 
Indeed  it  would  appear  that  idealism  already  contained 
in  its  body  certain  anti-bodies,  by-products  leading  to  a 
kind  of  auto-intoxication  which  intense  transcendental- 
ism seems  ever  destined  to  develop.    But  full  develop-     ,       _^ 
ment  had  not  yet  come.     It  is  a  fact  that,  in  the  very\       o^.'i"' 
year  of  the  founding  of  the  Concord  school,   Charles  1    ^ 
Peifce    suggested r/*^  Tjeff ain    incapacities     of    human )  / 
thought  "  which  led  to  the  disintegrating  skeptieisni  of 
pragmatism.    In  the  meanwhile,  before  that  disintegrat- 
ing skepticism  could  be  reached,  there  arose  two  forms  of 
involved  monism  which  we  shall  have  to  consider.    These 
are  what  we  shall  call  Royce's  system  of  romantic  ideal- 
ism and  Ladd's  system  of  science  and  idealism.    To  these 
two  masters,  at  Plarvard  and  at  Yale,  we  now  tuni. 


254  MODERN  IDEALISM 

3.    Romantic  Idealism:  Josiah  Royce 

Josiah  Royce  represents  the  romantic  side  of  our 
modem  thinking.  He  is  the  Ulysses  of  an  idealistic 
epic, — ' '  many  are  the  men  whose  towns  he  has  seen  and 
whose  minds  he  has  learnt."  By  birth  he  stands  for 
the  adventurous  spirit  of  the  California  pioneer;  by 
training,  for  the  learning  of  the  Eastern  seaboard  as  it 
was  brought  from  Europe.  A  student  in  Baltimore,  his 
early  articles  appeared  in  the  St.  Louis  Journal;  a 
teacher  for  many  years  at  Harvard,  he  has  been  called 
to  lecture  at  Aberdeen  and  at  Oxford.  From  the  variety 
and  amplitude  of  his  studies  in  metaphysics  and  mathe- 
matics, in  psychology  and  religion,  he  is  peculiarly  quali- 
fied to  interpret  "the  spirit  of  modern  philosophy." 
That  spirit  may  be  summed  up  in  one  word, — romanti- 
cism. This  has  as  its  chief  activities  the  cultivation  of 
the  inner  life ;  an  enlargement  of  the  powers  of  per- 
sonality; and  a  cosmic  imagination  which  strives  to 
express  all  phenomena  in  terms  of  the  Infinite,  the  Abso- 
lute. By  the  first  activity,  man  learns  to  free  his  spirit 
from  the  limitations  of  the  body;  to  discover  that  the 
true  world  is  not  made  up  of  sense  impressions.  By  the 
next  activity,  he  expands  his  mind  until  well-nigh  the 
whole  world  is  at  his  feet,  even  time  and  space.  By  the 
final  activity,  he  finds  that  the  finite  world  is  a  voluntary 
limitation  on  the  part  of  his  infinite  ego  and  that  only 
what  is  linked  with  the  Infinite  has  meaning  and  value. 
Such,  briefly,  is  romanticism  as  interpreted  hy  Novalis 
and  Fichte  and  Schlegel.  Of  like  mind  is  Royce,  who 
puts  the  matter  in  a  less  vague  and  more  satisfactory 
form  because  of  the  wealth  of  learning  at  his  disposal. 
He  begins  by  showing  that  there  are  two  aspects  of  ideal- 
ism.   The  fii-st  is  an  analysis  which  consists  in  pointin.g 


ROMANTIC  IDEALISM:  JOSIAH  ROYCE        255 

out  that  the  world  of  your  knowledge  is  through  and 
through  such  stuff  as  ideas  are  made  of.  Tlie  other  aspect 
is  the  one  which  gives  us  our  notion  of  the  absolute 
Self.  To  it  the  first  is  only  pro[)aratory.  for  this  world 
which  we  interpret  in  terms  of  our  ideas  exists  in  and 
for  a  standard,  an  universal  mind  whose  system  of 
ideas  constitutes  the  world.  Now,  all  this  may  be  mere 
speculative  boasting.  I  may  believe  that  the  infinite  con- 
scious Self  is  alone  sure,  but  I  have  to  give  a  reason  for 
this  faith.  Berkeley  has  made  the  method  familiar  when 
he  reasons  that  "  this  whole  choir  of  heaven  and  furni- 
ture of  earth  is  nothing  but  a  system  of  ideas."  .  .  . 
But  I  must  state  it  in  my  own  way,  although  one  in  vain 
seeks  novelty  in  illustrating  so  frequently  described  a 
view. 

Here,  then,  is  our  so  real  world  of  the  senses,  full  of 
light  and  warmth  and  sound.  If  anything  could  be 
solid  and  external,  surely,  one  at  first  will  say,  it  is  this 
world.  Hard  facts,  not  mere  ideas,  meet  us  on  every 
hand.  Ideas  anyone  can  mold  as  he  wishes.  Not  so 
facts.  In  idea  socialists  can  dream  out  Utopias,  dis- 
appointed lovers  can  imagine  themselves  successful,  beg- 
gars can  ride  horses,  wanderers  can  enjoy  the  fireside 
at  home.  In  the  realm  of  facts,  society  organizes  itself 
as  it  must,  rejected  lovers  stand  for  the  time  def(>ated. 
beggars  are  alone  with  their  wishes,  oceans  roll  drearily 
between  home  and  the  wanderer. 

Matter  and  mind  may  be  similar  in  being  stubliorn, 
but  does  this  make  them  essentially  alike?  "We  raise 
this  question  because  idealists  before  this  have  been  apt 
to  slip  into  the  fallacy  of  putting  a  part  for  the  whole,  or 
more  precisely  of  confusing  quality  with  totality. 
Royce  guards  against  all  this.  Much  of  the  outer  world, 
he  explains,  is  ideal :  the  coin  or  the  jewel  or  the  bank- 


256  MODERN  IDEALISM 

r  note  or  the  bond  has  its  value  not  alone  in  its  physical 
presence,  but  in  the  idea  that  it  symbolizes  to  the  be- 
holder's mind,  or  to  the  relatively  universal  thought  of 
the  commercial,  world.    So  part  of  the  properties  of  the 
j  i    objects  yonder  in  this  bright  sense-world  of  ours  is  ideal, 
[L.  for  odors  and  tastes  and  temperatures  do  not  exist  in 
I      those  objects  in  just  the  way  in  which  they  exist  in  us. 
\      Thus  for  temperatures,  a  well-known  experiment  will 
I      show  how  the  same  water  may  seem  cold  to  one  hand 
L^and  warm  to  the  other.     So  for  colors,  they  are  not  in 
^TK^c  things,  since  they  change  with  the  light,  vanish  in 
the  dark,  and  differ  for  different  eyes.     And  as  for 
sounds  they  exist  in  nature  only  as  voiceless  sound- 
waves trembling  through  the  air. 

These  are  familiar  arguments  and  easy  to  accept.  But 
can  we  follow  the  idealist  in  his  supposition  that  part 
of  the  being  of  these  properties  is  ideal,  if  not  all  of  it ; 
or,  at  the  best,  that  such  being  is  the  embodiment  of  the 
thought  or  purpose  of  some  world-mind  ?  There  are  here 
two  forward  steps,  one  of  which  appears  doubtful,  the 
other  dogmatic,  unless  the  very  dogma  serve  as  a  vindica- 
tion of  this  train  of  reasoning.  To  explain :  If  we  sup- 
pose that  the  place  of  all  sense  qualities  is  in  the  world- 
mind,  then  we  have,  as  Royce  suggests,  a  standard 
thought  of  which  ours  is  only  the  copy.  If  this  be  not 
so,  we  are  faced  with  this  dilemma:  Either  your  real 
world  yonder  is  through  and  through  a  world  of  ideas, 
an  outer  world  that  you  are  more  or  less  comprehending 
through  your  experience,  or  else,  in  so  far  as  it  is  real 
and  outer  it  is  unknowable,  an  inscrutable  x,  an  abso- 
solute  mystery.  There  is  no  third  alternative.  Either 
a  mind  yonder,  or  else  the  unknowable;  that  is  your 
choice. 
We  confess  that  this  dogma  relieves  the  dilemma,  but 


ROMANTIC  IDEALISM:  JOSIAH  ROYCE       257 


does  it  give  one  "  the  sensation  of  being  an  idealist  "? 
The  author  himself  raises  such  a  qui'stion  as  this:  Is 
not  this  result  very  disheartening?  ]\Iy  world  is  thus 
a  world  of  ideas,  but  alas !  how  do  I  then  ever  reach  those 
ideas  of  the  minds  beyond  me?  This  question  is  one 
that  has  been  called  by  one  of  the  new  realists  the  ego^ 
centric  predicament.  It  may  be  put  in  this  way :  I  may 
grant  that  knowledge  is  made  up  of  ideas,  but  are  they 
not  my  ideas  and,  therefore,  am  I  not  shut  up  in  the 
magic  circle  of  my  own  mind  ?  Royce  faces  the  predica- 
ment and  seeks  to  solve  it  in  this  wise:  The  answer  is 
simple,  but  in  one  sense  a  very  problematic  one.  You, 
in  one  sense,  never  do  or  can  get  beyond  your  own  ideas, 
nor  ought  you  to  wish  to  do  so,  because  in  truth  all  those 
other  minds  that  constitute  your  outer  and  real  world 
are  in  essence  one  with  your  own  self.  This  whole 
world  of  ideas  is  essentially  one  world,  is  essentially  the 
world  of  one  self  and  That  art  Thou.        t^c  »-■- 

The  answer  here  suggested  is^made^b^  means  of  a  tran- 
sition froiiTlhe  solipsistic  to  the  social.  Yet  by  what 
right  have  we  thus  to  pass  from  the  individual  to  the 
common  consciousness?  Ordinary  judgment  makes  the 
social  or  common  consciousness  merely  the  aggregate  of 
individual  minds;  just  as  the  "  population  "  of  a  coun-^ 
try  is  merely  the  sum-total  got  by  counting  head?.  The 
statistician  no  more  thinks  that  the  adding  together  of 
little  minds  makes  one  great  mind,  than  the  strict  con- 
structionist thinks  that  the  addition  of  political  states 
makes  an  extra  entity  called  "  The  Union."  Jiut  Uie 
idealist  reasons  differently.  He  is  neither  statistician, 
nor  strict  constructionist,  "fo  get  out  of  tlie  little  circle 
of  the  single  self  he  is  wont  to  call  on  a  larger  self,— 
the  social  consciousness,  tlie  spirit  of  the  times,  the 
World-Mind,— whatever  may  be  the  name  given  to  tliis 


\ 


258  MODERN  IDEALISM 

mysterious  One  who  "  relieves  us  from  dilemmas,  and 
saves  us  from  predicaments." 

We  confess  that  we  find  it  hard  to  follow  this  line  of 
argument,  for  it  involves  a  kind  of  cosmic  conceit,  a  con- 
viction that  in  the  evolution  of  the  Absolute,  the  unfold- 
ing of  the  Spirit,  we  mortals  play  a  major  part.    Yet 
Royce  goes  on  to  declare  that  such  participation  exists 
in  the  very  act  of  belief,  for  to  believe  anything  is  to 
I  stand  in  a  real  relation  to  truth,  a  relation  which  tran- 
Vscends  wholly  my  present,  momentary  self ;  and  this  real 
relation  is  of  such  a  curious  nature  that  only  a  larger 
inclusive  self  which  consciously  reflected  upon  my  mean- 
ing and  consciously  possessed  the  object  which  I  mean, 
could  Imow  or  grasp  the  reality  of  the  relation. 
yit  we  were  to  defend  this  idealistic  analysis,  we  might 
/say  that  the  act  ol- -knowing,  being~~a_  relating  process 
I  between  the  individual  and  the  object,  requires  some  con- 
I  necting  medium.     As  no  wireless  message  can  be  con- 
j  veyed  between  two  points  without  the  intangible  ether, 
so  must  the  knower  and  the  known  be  bathed  in  a  cir- 
cumambient Absolute.    This,  in  a  figure,  is  what  the  «iu- 
,thor  may  mean  when  he  refers  to  "  that  larger  Self 
that  includes  you  and  your  object."     William  James 
has  disposed  of  this  assumption  in  the  matter-of-fact 
statement  that  a  third  party  is  not  needed;  that  a  cat 
may  look  at  a  king  directly,  and  without  the  interven- 
tion of  anything  or  anybody.    But  for  the  idealist  this  is 
too  flat  and  unprofitable.    It  may  be  possible  to  live  along 
on  the  easy  path  of  simple  awareness ;  but  for  a  specu- 
lative system  we  require  a  more  complicated  scheme. 
Between  the  self  and  objects  no  help  may  be  needed 
for  a  relating  power  from  on  high;  jjut  between  self 
and  other  selves  there  is  a  more  mysterious  relation. 
The  kinship  of  mind  is  due  to  a  common  origin  and  a 


ROMANTIC  IDEALISM:  JOSIAH  ROYCE        259 

common  essence.  Such  may  well  be  Royce's  "  one  Self, 
organically,  reflectively,  consriously  inclusive  of  all  the 
selves, — the  divine  Logos  which  is  absolutely  the  only 
sure  thing  from  the  first  about  this  world." 

To  Royce,  as  to  Schelling,  man  is  a  menibcr  of  two 
worlds;  but  unlike  the  German  idealist,  who  sought  to 
preserve  a  perfect  balance  between  the  two,  the  Ameri- 
can apparently  thinks  that  by  depreciating  the  world  of 
description  he  thereby  appreciates,  or  adds  in  value  to, 
the  world  of  appreciation,  "Without  the  facts  of  appre- 
ciation, he  claims,  there  are  no  laws  of  description. 
Destroy  the  organic  and  appreciable  unity  of  the  world 
of  appreciative  beings,  and  the  describable  objects  all 
vanish, — atoms,  brains,  suns,  and  milk}-  ways  are  naught. 
...  Is  this  Roycean  paradox  an  apparent  reversal  ot^ 
judgment?  At  first  it  was  stated  that  the  universe  of 
appreciative  feelings  was  isolated;  that  feelings-  au'd 
emotions  were  strictly  privat^i  and,  therefore,  non- 
transferable. Now  it  is  stated  that  objects  in  space  and 
time  are  isolated,  but  that  spiritual  states  are  enmeshed 
in  a  common  net  of  spiritual  relationship. 

Here  is  a  return  to  the  notion  of  a  social  conscioHis- 
ness,  the  world  of  appreciation  being,  as  the  writer  ex- 
presses it,  one  of  a  sort  of  reflective  publicity  and 
interconnectedness.  "What  is  the  value  of  this  world  ?  As 
minds  are  above  molecules,  so,  it  is  argued,  the  world  of 
appreciation  is  the  deeper  reality,  its  rival,  the  world  of 
description,  being  a  result  of  an  essentially  human  and 
finite  outlook.  At  this  juncture  there  appears  a  defect 
in  the  system,— it  is  that  of  being  a  one-sided  scheme. 
The  admirable  balance  preserved  by  Schelling  between 
the  two  worlds  here  gives  way  to  the  propondcrancc  of 
the  one  over  the  other.  This  being  so.  Royce  is  forced 
to  acknowledge  that  "  the  unity  of  the  Logos  is  an  ap- 


260  MODERN  IDEALISM 

prceiablo,  but  not  a  describable  unity."  Certain  un- 
comfortable consequences  arise  from  this  distinction: 
If  the  unity  applies  to  but  one  world,  it  is  not  a  total 
unity ;  it  may  apply  to  the  higher  part,  but  that  is  not 
the  whole.  There  remains  the  world  of  description,  a 
mass  of  intractable  matter,  and  the  final  result  is  a  dual- 
ism. Man  is  a  member  of  two  worlds,  but  between  the 
two  worlds  there  is  no  organic  connection.  The  idealist 
acknowledges  as  much  in  calling  his  scheme  an  applica- 
tion of  the  double-aspect  theory.  Unlike  other  forms  of 
that  theory  which  declares  that  there  is  a  curious  kind 
of  substance  in  the  world,  a  substance  mysterious  and 
essentially  inscrutable  that  has  two  aspects,  the  mental 
and  the  physical,  this  theory,  contends  the  author,  under- 
takes to  know  what  this  substance  is.  It  is  the  conscious 
life  of  the  Logos,  whereof  my  friend  is  a  finite  instance. 
What  I  see  is  the  physical,  phenomenal  aspect  of  his 
inner  and  appreciative  life. 

In  using  the  word  phenomenal  Royce  appears  half 
an  agnostic.  The  body,  he  claims,  is  merely  a  very  im-  \ 
perfect  translation  of  the  mind ;  its  laws  belonging  not  ' 
to  the  inner  nature  as  such,  but  to  the  external  show  of 
this  nature;  these  laws  being  but  symbols  of  deeper 
truth.  If  the  problem  rested  here  we  might  contend 
that  the  idealist  has  laid  himself  open  to  the  inroads  of 
skepticism,  the  possibility  of  erroneous  judgment  in  the 
search  for  truth.  His  show  might  be  considered  a  vain 
show,  his  translation  a  mistranslation.  For  all  that  the 
finite  intelligence  knows,  the  double  aspect  might  be  a 
duplex  aspect,  or  rather  an  aspect  of  duplicity.  In 
other  words,  if  the  two  worlds  are  not  in  balance,  be- 
cause not  coordinate,  if  the  material  and  spiritual  are 
not  of  an  equivalence,  there  might  ensue  a  colossal 
equivocation.     The  outward  and  visible  signs  might  be 


ROMANTIC  IDEALISM:  JOSIAH  ROYCE        2G1 

misread,  the  symbols  variously  distorted  according  to 
the  personal  equation  of  the  observer.  This,  \ve  hold, 
is  the  danger  run  by  the  phcnomenalist ;  but  to  the  meta- 
physical idealist,  who  strives  to  think  things  through, 
there  is  a  further  refuge  from  doubt.  The  finite  intelli- 
gence must  be  wholly  of  an  agnostic  cast  unless  tlie  indi- 
vidual constructs  something  higher  than  himself.  This 
is  the  infinite  intelligence. 

Royce  had  once  avowed  that  the  idealist  welcomed 
the  fullest  agnosticism.  We  can  now  see  the  reason  for 
this.  Agnosticism  Is  a  spur  to  knowledge.  Like  a  trav- 
eler in  a  strange  land,  the  idealist  in  this  material  world 
is  forced  to  learn  the  language  of  the  country,  to  inter- 
pret the  gestures  which  nature  makes  to  him.  Behind 
the  signs,  the  symbols,  the  movements,  there  nuist  be  a 
meaning.  It  is  this  confidence  in  the  rationality  of  the 
universe  that  constitutes  the  refuge  of  the  high  idealist. 
Royce  has  perhaps  seemed  to  beg  the  question  in  using 
the  term  Logos,  Reason.  Now  comes  his  vindication 
of  the  use  of  that  term :  You  have  your  choice  of  three 
things.  There  is  blank  agnosticism,  which  makes  the 
universe  irredeemably  irrational,  a  mere  bedlam  of  nerv- 
ous jerks,  of  meaningless  motions.  There  is  also  a  partial 
agnosticism,  where  the  scientific  observer  is  never  sure 
that  his  reading  of  signs  is  not  a  misreading,  his  trans- 
lation of  facts  not  a  mistranslation.  There  is  finally  a 
choice  of  a  reasoned  gnosticism, — not  the  universe  of 
the  know-it-all,  but  the  universe  of  the  All-Knower.  The 
last  is  the  choice  of  Royce.  He  allows  that  the  world  of 
description  may  be  a  world  of  partial  doubt,  that  there 
may  be  a  misreading  of  the  mind  of  nature  similar  to  a 
misreading  of  the  mind  of  a  friend.  For  all  that  he 
insists  that  the  personal  equation  may  be  corrected,  and. 
by  a  process  of  trial  and  error,  the  errors  largely  elimi- 


262  MODERN  IDEALISM 

nated.  But  this  correction,  this  elimination,  cannot 
come  of  ourselves  alone.  The  individual  needs  not  only 
the  social  consciousness  but  the  world  consciousness. 
The  problem,  then,  concerns  a  certain  kind  of  truth, 
of  which  there  are  three  kinds.  Having  recognized  our- 
selves as  finite  beings,  we  become  aware  of  our  private 
world  of  inner  truth  as  distinguishable  from  the  truth 
as  experienced  by  other  men,  and  from  the  universal 
]  truth  of  the  all-knowing  world-consciousness.  A  new 
\  question  then  arises:  How  much  of  this  private 
"truth  of  ours  is  a  revelation  to  us  in  our  finitude  of  what 
other  finite  selves  can  also  know?  Finally  comes  the 
answer :  So  much  as  can  be  described  to  these  other  finite 
selves,  and  then,  in  their  experience,  appreciatively  veri- 
fied, may  be  regarded  as  not  our  private  content,  but  as 
universal. 
f  fs,^j'^  We  have  at  last  reached  a  true  transcendentalism; 

'      t*.    I        a  scale  of  truth  which  implies  a  scale  of  being,  that  is, 
y</**  a  series  of  spheres  in  which  the  ardent  soul  may  make 

0**        real    progress.     By    this    means    the    transcendentalist 
ifJ*    /J^breaks  out  of  the  magic  circle  of  the  self  into  the  social 
s/r      consciousness,  and  then  from  the  social   consciousness 
{J^  into  the  higher  consciousness  of  the  ' '  true  World-Will. ' ' 

Such  is  the  process  of  development  in  the  realm  of 
knowledge.  There  yet  remains  the  problem  of  the  rela- 
tion of  the  organic  world  to  our  human  consciousness. 
Here  the  author  is,  in  a  measure,  obliged  to  modify  his 
previous  declarations.  In  his  literal  appreciation,  or 
increasing  the  value,  of  the  world  of  appreciation  he 
had  tended  to  depreciate  the  world  of  description.  That 
world  he  must  now  bring  into  his  total  scheme,  and 
thereby  raise  to  a  higher  power.  When,  he  explains, 
I  think  of  the  stars  and  of  matter,  of  space  and  of  the 
energj^   that   appears   forever  to   be   dissipating  itself 


■^ 


i.-^ 


ROMANTIC  IDEALISM:  JOSIAH  ROYCE        2G3 

therein,  I  think  of  something  real,  or  else  of  merely  a 
private  experience  of  mine.  If,  now,  the  common  expori- 
ence  of  humanity  is  our  sufficient  warrant  for  assuming 
some  universal  reality  as  actually  embodied  in  these 
hot  stars  and  cold  interspaces,  of  what  sort  must  this 
reality  be?  In  and  for  itself,  we  now  answer:  It  must 
be  an  appreciable  reality,  the  expression  of  what,  in 
Schopenhauer's  sense  of  the  word,  may  be  called  a 
World-AVill ;  as  well  as  of  what,  in  Hegel 's  sense,  may  J 
be  called  an  Universal  Self-Conscious  Thought. 

Given  these  two  worlds,  and  there  is  suggested  an  an- 
swer to  the  last  and  most  difficult  problem, — that  of 
personal  freedom.  The  transcendentalist  may  have  his  (j^^„.^^: 
feet  in  the  mire  of  matter,  but  his  head  is  in  the  free 
air  of  the  spirit.  Such,  in  a  figure,  is  Royce's  answer, 
and  the  answer,  he  admits,  seems  paradoxical.  Granted 
that  the  cause  that  relates  to  the  world  of  description  is 
one  of  temporal  sequences,  and  that  the  only  cause  that 
you  can  seek  in  the  world  of  appreciation  is  in  a  verj' 
different  sense  a  cause,  namely,  a  justification  for  this 
or  that  act, — does  this  relieve  the  situation  ?  The  double 
aspect  theory  has  seemingly  degenerated  into  an  aspect 
of  duplicity,  if  not  of  equivocation.  A  word  means  one 
thing  here  and  another  there.  j\Ioreover  it  makes  man 
apparently  a  creature  of  caprice,  constant  to  one  thing 
never ;  one  foot  on  the  land  of  fixed  necessity,  the  other 
on  the  shifting  sea  of  freedom.  How  sliall  the  idealist 
escape  such  criticism  ?  He  does  it  as  have  other  roman- 
ticists, by  practically  denying  one  kind  of  personal  voli- 
tion. He  concedes  that  what  the  physical  organism  it-' 
self  will  do,  is  physiologically  determined  by  the  whoh^ 
order  of  nature  and  by  the  whole  of  past  time,  and  that 
the  will  moves  no  atom  of  this  mechanism  aside  from 
its  predestined  force.     How  explain  such   a   paradox? 


264  MODERN  IDEALISM 

The  answer  is  the  expected  answer.  Royee,  as  a  strict 
dualist,  is  a  strict  parallelist,  and  therefore  allows  no 
interaction  between  mind  and  body  in  the  world  of  de- 
scription. 

In  like  manner,  in  the  world  of  appreciation,  he 
allows  no  interaction,  in  the  way  of  control,  between 
the  individual  mind  and  other  minds.  As  my  will  can- 
not move  the  body  below  it,  so  a  higher  will  cannot 
move  my  will,  unless  I  choose  to  follow,  by  an  act 
of  appreciation,  some  thought  emanating  from  that 
higher  Self.  We  conceive  the  answer  to  the  problem  of 
freedom  should  stop  here,  with  what  is  practically  a 
revival  of  the  Platonic  doctrine  of  participation.  This 
doctrine  teaches  that  the  lesser  partakes  ideally  of  the 
greater,  the  ectype  being  of  the  same  nature  as  the 
archetype.  Now,  in  attempting  to  bring  our  thoughts 
into  conformity  with  that  of  the  supreme  Self,  we  may 
be  in  an  ideal  relation,  which  at  any  time  we  are  at 
liberty  to  break.  Yet  we  are  hardly,  as  Royce  contends, 
conscious  bits  of  that  Self,  nor  is  our  conscious  volition 
a  fragment  of  the  freedom  of  the  World- Will.  We  raise 
the  objection  that  to  identify  an  act  of  the  individual 
with  that  of  the  Absolute,  is  to  make  the  individual  lose 
his  personal  identity.  It  is  like  an  inventor  working 
for  a  corporation  and  thereby  losing  all  patent  rights  to 
his  invention.  Royce  acknowledges  as  much  in  a  final 
rhetorical  question:  What  then,  though  we  are  bound 
in  the  temporal  world,  may  we  not  indeed  be  free, — 
yes,  and  in  a  non-temporal  and  transcendent  sense  ef- 
fective, too,  in  the  eternal  world?  May  we  not  in  fact, 
as  parts  of  an  eternal  order,  be  choosing  not  indeed  this 
or  that  thing  in  time,  but  helping  to  choose  out  and  out 
what  world  this  fatal  temporal  world  shall  eternally 
he  and  have  heen? 


IDEALISM  AND  SCIENCE  265 

With  what  he  modestly  calls  a  "  dim  suggt-stion  " 
Royce  concludes  the  constructive  part  of  this  "  first 
sketch  "  of  his  system.  The  suggestion  harks  back  to 
the  German  romanticists  as  poets,  makers,  world-buildci-s. 
It  also  points  forward  to  the  current  doctrine  of  creative 
evolution,  where  the  luiiverse  is  still  in  the  making,  and 
man  a  junior  partner  in  the  business.  Or,  to  use  a  less 
commercial  figure,  this  final  suggestion  preserves  the 
Koycean  system  from  the  fate  of  absolutism.  As  in  the 
case  of  pliilosophy  and  politics,  where  absolute  sov- 
ereignty w'as  forced  to  give  way  to  personal  sovereignty, 
so  in  this  case.  The  seemingly  insidious  inroad  on  the 
liberties  of  the  individual  is  prevented  by  the  doctrine 
of  voluntary  participation  of  the  free  agent.  Just  as 
there  may  be  a  political  union  which  conserves  the  re- 
served rights  of  the  state,  so  may  there  be  organic 
spiritual  relations  whereby  "  all  the  spirits  are  together 
in  one  Spirit." 

4.   Idealism  and  Science  :  George  Trumbull  Ladd 

The  system  of  Royce  is  like  a  lofty  palace  with  cloud- 
capped  pinnacles  and  lofty  towers,  but  withal  built  upon 
an  insubstantial  footing.  The  system  of  Ladd  is  a  struc- 
ture of  a  different  sort.  While  Royce  ' '  a  stately  pleas- 
ure dome  decrees,"  Ladd  prosaically  sets  to  work  to 
dig  deep  foundations.  On  the  one  hand  is  the  romanti- 
cist with  high  poetic  imagination;  on  the  other  is  the 
engineer  of  metaphysics,  who  will  erect  no  edifice, until 
he  has  carefully  examined  the  ground,  who  will  make  no 
promises  until  he  has  calculated  the  stresses  and  strains. 
The  foundations  of  philosophy,  according  to  Ladd.  arc 
wide  and  deep.  Tlrey  cover  all  the  sciences  and  go  down 
as  far  as  investigation  has  gone.    It  is,  therefore,  pre- 


266  MODERN  IDEALISM 

sumptuous  to  call  philosophy  the  science  of  the  sciences ; 
it  should  rather  be  considered  a  summation  of  the  sci- 
ences. Just  as  an  immense  modern  business  structure  calls 
in  the  geologist,  the  engineer,  the  architect,  and  a  host  of 
allied  agents,  so  that  skyscraper  called  metaphysics  is 
impossible  without  the  aid  of  all  knowing  men.  Unless 
it  avail  itself  of  their  services  and  reach  the  rock  bottom 
of  reality,  it  will  be  not  only  uninhabitable,  but  will 
collapse  of  its  own  weight.  Such,  in  a  figure,  is  the  im- 
pression conveyed  by  Ladd's  latest  work.  Knowledge, 
Life,  and  Reality.  The  work  is  compact  and  well  built, 
but  like  the  modern  business  structure  the  first  glimpse 
of  it  is  not  particularly  alluring.  Thus  we  are  told 
that  philosophy  should  be  taken  seriously,  and  that  re- 
flective thinking  is  a  duty.  With  this  we  beg  to  differ. 
It  is  opposed  to  the  very  meaning  of  the  word  in  ques- 
tion. When  the  author  points  out  that  philosopher 
means  a  lover  of  knowledge,  that  also  means  that  he  is 
a  lover  of  pleasure, — the  pleasure  of  knowing.  The 
compelling  curiosity  of  which  Aristotle  spoke  is  the  real 
motive  behind  speculation.  The  Greeks  were  right. 
Philosophy  is  not  so  much  a  duty  as  a  pleasure,  and  a 
philosopher  not  so  much  an  agonizing  contestant,  as  a 
spectator  at  the  games.  There  is,  of  course,  a  serious 
side  to  this.  One's  favorite  may  fail  and  the  race  be 
lost,  but  this  does  not  keep  one  away  from  the  next 
Olympiad.  We,  therefore,  beg  to  maintain  that  men  do 
not  enter  into  metaphysics  *'  discreetly  and  soberly," 
but  with  curiosity  and  excitement.  A  prolegomenon  to 
metaphysics  is  like  a  prologue  to  a  play, — it  is  a  spur 
to  expectancy.  A  stranger  in  the  land  of  speculation 
is  as  one  who  enters  by  night  into  a  foreign  city  and 
wonders  how  it  will  look  by  daylight. 

Although  differing  as  to  the  spirit  with  which  philos- 


IDEALISM  AND  SCIENCE  267 

ophy  should  be  approached,  we  can  agree  as  to  the 
author's  general  conception  of  the  subject.  Ilis  first 
point  is  a  disavowal  of  dogma.  The  pliilosopher  wiio 
knows  his  business,  knows  that  the  attempt  to  deduce 
the  facts  and  laws  of  the  positive  sciences  from  some 
fonn  of  a  theory  of  the  Idea,  or  of  the  Absolute,  must 
be  forever  abandoned.  lie  also  knows  that  philosophy 
must  take  the  world  as  science  finds  it,  for  it  is  the  real 
world,  and  not  any  merely  conjectured  world,  which 
philosophy  desires  to  help  science  more  profoundly  to 
interpret.  The  philosopher  is,  accordingly,  not  a  domi- 
nator  but  an  adjudicator.  He  does  not  aspire  to  be  the 
president  of  a  syndicate  which  shall  have  bought  or 
grabbed  up  all  the  separate  mining  claims.  He  tries 
to  straighten  out  the  confusion  in  respect  to  these  claims. 
This  is  difficult  because  the  confusion  is  cosmic.  The 
universe  being  a  whole,  of  which  each  science  presents 
a  part,  every  particular  science  finds  itself  confronted 
with  problems  which  belong  to  the  domain  of  some  other 
science.  Physics  and  chemistry  cannot  be  kept  wholly 
apart;  chemistry  is  part  of  biology;  biologj-  is  compli- 
cated with  psychology,  and  so  on. 

Into  this  Wild  West  of  conflicting  claims  enters  the 
philosopher.  He  himself  has  staked  no  claims  and  repre- 
sents no  company,  but  like  a  government  expert  he  is 
there  to  straighten  out  the  tangle.  He  cannot  satisfy 
everj'body,  yet  he  can  send  back  a  fairly  clear  report  to 
headquarters.  The  report  is  accompanied  by  a  map,  and 
this  map  of  metaphysics  is  now  presented  to  us.  There 
are  in  the  field  two  rival  companies.  One  is  realism,  the 
other  idealism.  How  shall  they  be  reconciled?  By  the 
simple  expedient  of  a  hyphen  are  the  rivals  amalga- 
mated. Like  a  British-American  mining  company,  we 
have,  therefore,  two  parties— one  furnishing  the  capital, 


2GS  MODERN  IDEALISM 

the  other  the  brains.  Now,  if  this  were  a  wild-eat  com- 
pany, we  might  have  one  party  absconding  with  the 
capital  and  the  other  left  with — the  experience!  But 
the  company  is  legitimate  and  tries  to  do  a  legitimate 
business.  It  may  ultimately  attempt  to  be  absolute — 
in  that  rosy  future  when  it  shall  have  absorbed  all  rivals. 
At  present  it  sticks  to  its  territory  and  tries  to  dig  ore. 
In  other  words,  the  sources  of  philosophy  are  not  chiefly 
subjective.  A  synthesis  of  facts,  not  a  printing  of  pro- 
spectuses, is  the  task  of  the  present-day  philosopher,  since 
there  lies  before  the  thinker  of  modern  type  a  whole  new 
world  of  discoveries. 

In  both  methods  and  materials  philosophy  should  then 
be  empirical.  Conversely,  the  sciences  should  be  theoret- 
ical. Just  as  the  sciences  interpenetrate  one  another,  so 
philosophy  should  interpenetrate  the  sciences.  Other- 
wise we  fall  into  the  strange  illusions  of  which  Haeckel 
complains,  the  illusion  held  by  the  physicists  that  they 
can  construct  the  edifice  of  natural  science  from  facts 
without  a  philosophical  connection  of  the  same.  Ladd, 
as  is  his  wont,  substantiates  his  opinions  by  German 
thought.  It  might  be  supplemented  by  French  views, 
views  such  as  those  of  Poincare,  that  science  and  hypoth- 
esis go  hand  in  hand,  that  the  one  cannot  advance  with- 
out the  instrumentality  of  the  other.  And  yet  the  Ameri- 
can author  might  have  reached  his  conclusion  without 
any  foreign  aid,  for  his  premises  lead  to  the  logical  con- 
clusion that  specialization  should  be  corrected  by  syn- 
thesis, that  the  breaking  up  of  the  larger  domain  into 
small  allotments  should  not  go  on  forever.  "  Divide 
and  rule  "  is  held  to  be  an  excellent  maxim  for  the 
sake  of  concentration.  Yet  beside  the  intensive  culti- 
vation possible  within  the  fenced  lines  of  specialization 
there  is  an  extensive  cultivation  of  which  science  itself 


IDEALISM  AND  SCIENCE  269 

gives  the  hint  every  time  it  speaks  of  a  Universe,  or  of  a 
World,   which  is  in  any  manner  or  measure   One. 

With  these  distinctions  in  mind  we  may  inquire  to 
what  school  we  should  assign  the  author.  lie  wishes 
it  to  be  understood  that  he  belongs  to  none,  and  yet  to 
all.  He  sees  that  variety  in  philosophy  is  a  sign  of  life, 
just  as  variety  in  crops  is  a  sign  of  fertility.  In  these 
conclusions  the  cosmopolite  speaks.  Having  taught  in 
Japan  and  India,  as  well  as  in  different  parts  of  America, 
Ladd  informs  us  that  he  has  learned  much  from  his  o\vn 
pupils,  both  Oriental  and  Occidental.  But  he  is  satisfied 
neither  with  the  mystical  cry  of  the  East,  nor  with  the 
scientific  formulas  of  the  West.  The  dissatisfaction 
being  profound,  the  crisis  becomes  acute.  This  crisis  is 
emphasized  and  with  a  purpose,  namely,  that  the  allevia- 
tion may  be  the  greater.  It  is  by  com  promise,  as  a  sort 
of  adhesive  plaster,  that  the  torn  wound  is  at  last  brought 
together.  If  neither  a  purely  idealistic  nor  a  purely 
realistic  system  of  philosophy  can  be  maintained,  yet 
a  combination  of  the  two  may  hold.  The  combination 
is  found  in  what  might  be  entitled  a  vitalizing  of  the 
problem.  In  the  body-mind  controversy  we  have  in 
theory'  two  conflicting  elements;  but  in  the  living  self 
we  find  the  two  united.  Likewise  in  the  larger  contro- 
versy respecting  matter  and  spirit :  Why  should  not  ninn 
interpret  the  universe  as  a  totality,  in  terms  of  reality 
as  experienced  by  himself,  that  is  to  say,  in  terms  of  an 
experience  of  the  life  of  a  self?  In  the  Imowledge  of 
life  we  have  a  suggested  solution  of  reality.  We  are 
now  enabled  to  go  a  step  further.  In  vitalizing  the 
given  elements  we  look  from  without  upon  a  given  whole 
—bodies  and  minds  brought  together.  In  psychologizing 
those  elements  we  go  deeper  and  look  from  within— 
upon  a  rational  whole.     In  a   word,  the  principle  of 


270  MODERN  IDEALISM 

knowledge  is  personalism.  As  one  knows  his  body 
and  mind  united  in  a  single  self,  so  may  one  know 
the  body  of  nature  as  infused  with  one  immanent 
mind. 

This  is  going  too  fast.  Before  we  can  approach  the 
philosophy  of  nature  we  must  work  out  a  philosophy 
of  human  nature.  In  this  field  the  first  problem  is  what 
kind  of  knowledge  I  have  of  myself.  Is  it  illusory  and 
transitory,  or  actual  and  dependable?  Ladd  gives  the 
old  realistic  answer:  I  look  within  and  find  myself  pos- 
sessed of  a  self  which  is  immediate  and  indubitable. 
Such  knowledge  has  this  further  advantage:  it  makes 
me  sure  of  myself.  And  so,  for  one  thing,  I  am  no 
stream  of  consciousness,  since,  even  as  a  figurative 
watcher  on  the  banks,  I  really  do  not  separate  myself 
from  that  stream.  Such  are  the  arguments  of  the  idealist 
of  Yale  College.  For  the  sake  of  the  contrast  let  us 
turn  for  a  moment  to  representatives  of  the  rival  insti- 
tution against  which  these  contentions  are  evidently 
directed.  Against  self-knowledge  as  immediate  and  in- 
dubitable we  can  put  the  statements  of  Royce  as  to  the 
relativity  and  insecurity  of  such  knowledge.  To  a  path- 
ological case  how  futile  would  be  the  advice  "  To  thine 
own  self  be  true  "!  Moreover,  against  the  substantial 
identity  of  the  self  we  can  put  the  doctrine  of  James, 
which  substitutes  for  a  self  a  so-called  "  stream  of  con- 
sciousness." A  favorite  phrase  of  Ladd's  is  that  "  states 
of  consciousness  do  not  constitute  consciousness  of 
states."  But  suppose  we  add  " — unless  that  conscious- 
ness of  states  is  one  of  the  states  of  consciousness. ' '  The 
problem  is  puzzling,  but  Royce  in  turn  has  given  a 
subtle  answer  to  that  very  question  of  how  the  true  mind 
may  find  itself.  It  is  by  making  its  way  through  a  med- 
ley of  parasitical ' '  minds, ' '  abnormal  states  of  conscious- 


IDEALISM  AND  SCIENCE  271 

ness,  which  are  to  the  normal  self  what  noxious  germs 
are  to  their  host.  And  James  in  his  doctrine  of  the 
specious  moment — that  snapshot  glimpse  of  the  stream 
of  consciousness — has  shown  witli  what  baffling  speed 
the  mind,  so  to  speak,  always  keeps  ahead  of  itself. 

There  is  much  food  for  thought  in  this  controversy 
regarding  the  self  as  aberrant  and  evanescent,  over 
against  the  self  as  indubitable  and  immediate.  If  the  dis- 
tinctions are  too  sharply  drawn  the  issue  becomes  a 
false  one.  There  may  be  multiple  states  of  conscious- 
ness, yet  out  of  these  we  may  pick  a  single  state  and 
call  it  the  principle  of  self-identity,  and  even  grant  that 
it  is  unique.  Just  as  for  practical  purposes  many  politi- 
cal states  may  constitute  a  federal  union,  so  that  pecu- 
liar state  called  self-recognition,  may  be  the  bond  of 
psychological  union.  This  does  not  preclude  the  times 
and  seasons  in  normal  life  when  one  is  not  "  sure  "  of 
one's  self,  nor  the  abnormal  cases  of  almost  complete 
self-abnegation  or  forgetfulness.  As  there  may  be 
"  sick  "  moments  in  a  healthy  mind,  so  may  there  be  a 
healthy  mind  back  of  the  sick  moments.  That  at  least 
is  the  hope  upon  which  the  pathologist,  as  physician 
of  souls,  carries  on  his  work.  He  is  not  bothered  with 
figures  of  speech  about  streams  of  consciousness  or  the 
futile  flow  of  sensations ;  he  asks  only  for  a  single  sane 
moment  of  self-recognition  upon  which  to  crystallize 
his  cure. 

We  wish  the  author  had  sought  to  reach  reality 
through  such  a  study  of  unreality.  Ladd's  interesting 
studies  in  hypnotism  might  profitably  have  been  car- 
ried further  to  illuminate  this  problem.  We  may.  how- 
ever, suggest  one  way  of  escape  out  of  the  maze  of 
mentality.  Suppose  the  patient  has  lost  the  conscious- 
ness of  self,  or  the  sense  of  personality  has  temporarily 


272  MODERN  IDEALISM 

disappeared.  Suppose.,  again,  that  hypnotic  suggestion 
is  applied  to  the  subconscious  or  subliminal  realm. 
Now,  until  the  submerged  self  has  somehow  been  made 
to  rise  to  the  surface  of  consciousness,  it  cannot  be 
dogmatically  asserted  that  the  true  self  is  lost  or  non- 
existent. We  may  hold  with  the  author  that  there  is 
ever  in  man  a  rational  principle,  whether  latent  or 
patent,  but  does  it  follow  from  this  that  there  is  one 
immanent  mind  in  nature  ?  In  examining  the  pathologi- 
cal doubt  of  self  we  have,  as  it  were,  been  fighting  for 
our  souls,  but  that  is  far  from  a  warfare  in  behalf  of  the 
world-soul.  The  individual  may  wish  to  remain  master 
of  this  little  world  of  self.  But  to  turn  that  microcosm 
into  a  macrocosm,  to  undertake  to  run  the  universe  after 
the  analogy  of  the  self,  is  highly  presumptuous,  if  noth- 
ing else. 

The  realist,  at  this  point,  turns  into  the  idealist.  He 
reads  in  the  sky  "  huge  cloudy  symbols  of  a  high  ro- 
mance." We  follow  him  with  difficulty.  It  is  one  thing 
to  say  that  we  are  sure  of  ourselves  because  we  are  di- 
rectly aware  of  our  states  of  consciousness.  It  is  another 
thing  to  imagine  ourselves  identical  with  even  the  small- 
est part  of  that  great  soul  which  informs  the  mighty 
mass.  The  mystic  claims  to  do  it  by  means  of  his  inner 
light ;  the  esthete  by  his  supposition  of  ' '  empathy, ' '  of 
a  feeling  one's  self  into  an  object  of  art.  But  we 
confess  that  these  very  claims  conflict  with  a  true  indi- 
viduality. Individuality  means  that,  being  myself,  I 
am  separate  from  other  objects ;  that  I  am  neither  a  mere 
spark  of  the  divine  fire,  nor  an  imaginary  state  of  mind 
of  some  graven  image.  These  are  some  of  the  difficulties 
that  we  face  as  we  enter  upon  Ladd's  philosophy  of  na- 
ture. It  is  easy  to  say  that  as  there  is  a  mind  in  my 
body,  so  there  is  one  immanent  mind  in  the  body  of 


IDEALISM  AND  SCIENCE  273 

nature, — but  it  is  hard  to  grasp  this  "  sense  sublime 
of  something  far  more  deeply  interfused." 

To  obtain  this  high  knowledge  three  avenues  of  ap- 
proach are  suggested :  through  the  beliefs  of  the  primi- 
tive man;  through  the  beliefs  of  the  seientist;  through 
the  beliefs  of  the  philosopher.  The  primitive  man  be- 
lieves in  invisible  spiritual  agencies, — he  has  a  simple, 
childlike  way  of  attributing  souls  to  certain  things.  The 
scientist  believes  in  laws  as  modes  of  the  behavior  of 
things, — he  treats  regular  phenomena  as  if  they  were 
regular  habits.  The  philosopher  believes  in  a  system, 
and  a  system  implies  central  control  and  a  realization  of 
ideal  ends.  Let  us  examine  these  three  beliefs.  Do  the 
savage  and  the  seientist  really  support  the  philosopher? 
At  the  most  the  scientist  has  little  use  for  the  savage, 
except  as  a  sort  of  interesting  mental  scandal.  As 
Fiske  puts  it :  In  the  primitive  hypothesis  the  forces  of 
nature  must  have  been  likened  to  human  volition  because 
there  was  nothing  else  with  which  to  compare  them. 
Again  the  scientist,  of  the  positive  type,  objects  to  being 
turned  into  a  savage  in  having  his  "  laws  "  personified. 
There  is  human  behavior  and  cosmic  behavior,  but  the 
two  are  by  no  means  one. 

The  idealist  is  in  a  fix.  Mythology  will  not  help  mon- 
ism because  it  is  too  animistic.  Mechanism  will  not 
help  monism  because  it  refuses  to  be  anthropomorphic, — 
its  god  is  not  made  in  the  image  of  man.  What  then? 
Let  us  confine  the  savage  in  a  mental  reservation  of  igno- 
rance, but  keep  the  scientist  and  reexamine  his  beliefs. 
Is  mechanism  tenable?  Can  science  "  purify  the  causal 
concept  of  the  elements  contributed  by  emotion  and 
w^U"?  No!  responds  Ladd,  or  else  science  reduces 
explanation  to  a  lifeless  body  of  abstractions  and  empty 
formulas  which  give  no  real  account  of  anything.    The 


274  MODERN  IDEALISM 

solution  has  already  been  suggested.  It  is  personalism. 
Metaphysics,  continues  the  idealist,  interprets  mecha- 
nism in  terms  of  personal  experience.  There  are  here 
two  grounds  of  reinterpretation.  In  general,  causality 
is  no  invisible  bond  which  seizes  hold  upon  things  from 
without  and  forces  them  into  a  semblance  of  unity. 
Causal  connection,  when  analyzed,  appears  not  so  much 
like  the  external  and  merely  visible  connections  of  a 
machine,  but  rather  like  the  felt  connections  of  a  con- 
scious self.  In  particular,  the  student  of  nature  sees, 
what  the  ordinary  observer  cannot  see;  he  sees  amoebas, 
and  bacteria,  and  white-blood  corpuscles,  and  ova,  and 
cilia,  and  single  cells  or  groups  of  cells,  in  all  forms  of 
living  tissue,  behaving  in  a  more  or  less  self-like  way. 
Nor  can  he  arrest  his  suspicions  of  something  immanent 
in  the  reality  which,  in  some  faint  measure  at  least,  cor- 
responds to  his  own  conscious  life,  when  he  minutely 
observes  the  behavior  of  the  different  beings  belonging 
to  the  world  of  plants.  For,  in  the  first  place,  at  the 
lower  limits  of  the  two  so-called  kingdoms,  it  is  difficult 
or  impossible  for  him  to  tell  to  which  of  the  two  certain 
species  should  be  assigned.  And,  second,  many  of  those 
species,  about  the  plant-like  nature  of  which  there  is 
no  doubt,  show  clearer  evidences  of  a  soulful  existence 
than  do  many  forms,  and  these  by  no  means  the  lowest,  of 
animal  life. 

Ladd  is  here  approaching  firmer  ground.  It  is  the 
ground  of  neo-vitalism.  In  place  of  the  older  mechanism, 
the  Cartesian  and  Newtonian  explanation  of  the  world 
as  made  up  of  masses  and  forces,  there  has  arisen  the 
new  biology.  This  grants,  for  example,  to  the  ovum  a 
nature  rich  and  wonderful,  a  capacity  not  only  to  make 
itself  behave  as  a  being-in-itself,  but  also  to  make  other 
beings  which  behave  like  itself.     There  is  also  the  new 


IDEALISM  AND  SCIENCE  275 

astronomy  which  holds  that  all  the  planets  in  the  solar 
system  behave  "  as  though  they  knew  "  how  they  ought 
to  behave  under  all  the  circumstances,  and  taking  into 
account  their  actual  relations  to  all  other  things.  There 
is  finally  the  new  physics  which  takes  the  forces  of 
gravity  as  implying  between  the  atoms  literal  affinities, 
or  forces  that  have  preferences,  and  thereby  imports  a 
self  into  mere  mechanism. 

There  now  looms  up  another  parting  of  the  ways. 
Some  scientists  would  go  on  with  the  idealists,  others 
would  not.  To  many  mechanism  seems  sufficient,  and 
any  attempt  to  personalize  the  phenomena  of  nature, 
whether  organic  or  inorganic,  appears  mere  poetic  li- 
cense. Men  of  this  stripe  refuse  to  accompany  the 
idealist  on  the  high  a  priori  road.  When  he  says  that 
the  measurableness  of  material  things  implies  mentality, 
that  concrete  realities  obey  rational  principles,  that  the 
category^  of  force  is  the  outgrowth  of  personal  experience, 
they  raise  stout  objections.  For  example,  both  those  neo- 
realists  and  pragmatists,  who  are  radical  empiricists,  de- 
mand that  the  tables  be  turned.  They  reason  just  the 
other  way,  arguing  that  mentality  is  derived  from  meas- 
urableness; that  rational  principles  grow  out  of  con- 
crete realities;  that  personal  experience  is  the  out- 
growth of  the  feeling  of  force  in  obstructing  objects. 

Is  there  any  way  in  which  to  reconcile  these  divergent 
views?  We  believe  there  is,  for  the  reason  that  the  two 
schools  have  been  looking  at  the  same  object  from  oppo- 
site sides.  That  object  is  nature.  The  side  the  empiri- 
cists look  at  is  the  outside,  the  environment.  The  stone 
wall  of  hard  facts  against  which  I  run,— that  is  what 
gives  me  the  rational  principles  I  call  empirical.  Con- 
trariwise, the  side  the  idealist  takes  is  the  inside;  he 
looks    at    nature    from    within;    he    considers    himself 


276  MODERN  IDEALISM 

already  over  the  wall,  already  in  possession  of  the 
key  to  the  fortress  of  fact.  And  we  ask  again : 
Can  these  two  points  of  view  be  in  the  posses- 
sion of  the  same  person?  Ladd's  fellow-idealist  Royce 
gives  an  amusing  illustration  to  show  that  the  achieve- 
ment is  possible.  He  alleges  that  as  selves  we  have 
the  paradoxical  power  of  being  both  subjects  and  ob- 
jects :  I  may  be  meditating  in  my  study,  yet  I  can  run 
out  of  the  house  and  look  in  at  the  window  and  see  myself 
still  sitting  inside.  Or  we  might  cite  the  case  of  an 
optical  illusion,  of  a  spherical  figure  which  appears 
at  one  moment  convex,  at  the  next  concave.  To  the  eye 
that  figure  goes  through  alternating  changes,  yet  com- 
mon sense  tells  us  that  the  figure  itself  does  not  change. 
In  other  words,  just  as  the  so-called  specious  moment  of 
introspection  may  be  explained  by  a  shifting  of  the  point 
of  view,  so  may  the  idealist's  world  be  looked  at  from 
two  points  of  view.  As  an  object  by  itself  the  world 
may  be  mechanical ;  but  as  known  to  man  all  things  are 
self-like,  since  the  nature  of  anything  is  internal.  This 
is  Ladd's  solution  of  the  paradox,  a  solution  in  close 
agreement  with  Royce 's  two  worlds, — the  scientific 
world  of  description,  the  metaphysical  of  appreciation. 
But  the  Yale  thinker  has  perhaps  gone  a  step  further. 
To  put  a  line  of  Emerson  in  positive  form,  the  World- 
Ground  might  be  held  to  say  not  only  "  I  am  the  doubter 
and  the  doubt,"  but  also  "  I  am  the  knower  and  the 
known."  Thus  the  absolute  whole  divides  itself  into 
two  parts,  not  separate  and  distinct  halves  of  a  total 
sphere,  but  two  aspects  of  the  same  totality ;  on  the  one 
side  a  system  of  things  already  formed,  on  the  other  a 
universal  life,  a  force  formative  and  progressive  accord- 
ing to  ideas. 
With  Ladd  we  have  reached  the  climax  of  the  later 


IDEALISM  AND  SCIENCE  277 

idealism.     Now,  idealism  has  been  called  the  most  per- 
sistent form  of  philosophizing  in  tlie  course  of  American 
thought.     From  Johnson  and   Edwards  to  Royce  and 
Ladd  the  current,  whether  above  or  below  ground,  has 
had  an  unbroken  flow.    It  had  its  sources  in  the  Platon- 
izing  Puritans,  gained  impetus  by  the  deistic  evidences 
of  design,  was  swollen  by  the  spring  freshet  of  German 
romanticism,  and  yet  has  ever  been  kept  in  bounds  by 
the  "  genteel  tradition  "  of  theism.    But  there  are  signs 
that  this  stream  is  fatally  diverging,  if  not  drying  up. 
Other  interests  are  becoming  paramount.    Pragmatism, 
the  new  radical  empiricism,  abandons  the  absolute  for 
the  relative,  cares  less  for  cosmic  purpose  than  for  in- 
dividual achievement,  and  owes  allegiance  not  so  much 
to  the  reign  of  law  as  to  the  reign  of  results.    But  be- 
fore taking  up  with  the  paramount  pragmatism  let  us 
briefly  consider  certain  reasons  for  its  present  vogue. 
One  cause  lies  in  the  contrast  between  the  amateur  and 
the  professional  philosopher.     The  ordinary  thinker  is  1 
content  to  study  the  three  problems  of  man,  nature,   I 
God, — as  they  run  along  side  by  side.    The  metaphysi-  I 
cian,  on  the  other  hand,  is  a  monopolist  who  seeks  to  I 
make  a  merger  of  the  parallel  lines.     Like  a  railroad  ( 
magnate,  to  his  mind  all  should  be  under  a  single  man-  \ 
agement.    But  this  merger  may  be  held  by  many  to  be  1 
logically  illegal,   a  kind  of  conspiracy  in  restraint  or 
thought.     Suppose  the  Absolute  controls  each  and  all, 
where  is  there  room  for  the  liberty  of  the  individual? 
In  this  case,  if  liberty  be  granted,  is  it  not  specious, 
because  a  mere  manifestation  of  the  divine  activity? 
Does  not  the  same  follow  in  respect  to  nature  as  the 
present  expositor  of  the  divine  mind?     If  nature  be 
granted  an  independent  existence,  is  it  not  illusorj'.  a 
vain  show,  a  phantasm  of  reality?    Questions  like  these 


278  MODERN  IDEALISM 

are  asked  of  the  absolutist  on  the  part  of  one  who  desires 
independency.  The  monist  is  unable  to  substantiate  an 
Absolute,  and  the  critic  exclaims  in  desperation :  Let  us 
leave  good  enough  alone.  Let  us  be  pluralists,  believers 
in  the  existence  of  separate  beings  which  follow  their 
own  particular  paths.  Instead  of  an  ordered  universe 
and  an  Absolute  as  "  a  seeing  force  which  runs  things," 
let  us  have  before  us  this  rich  medley  of  facts,  this 
world  of  buzzing  confusion.  Now,  such  a  philosophy 
of  pluralism,  at  the  present  moment,  seems  the  typical 
American  philosophy.  The  day  of  monopoly  is  passing. 
In  its  stead  we  have  the  age  of  independence,  individual- 
ism, and  competition, — the  three  marks  of  "  trium- 
phant "  democracy. 


CHAPTER  IX 
PRAGMATISM 

1.   PiLiGMATiSM :  The  Philosophy  of  Practic.vlitt 

**  The  Western  Goth,  so  fiercely  practical,  so  keen  of 
eye  "  has  at  last  gotten  himself  a  philosophy.  It  is 
pragmatism,  the  philosophy  of  practicality,  the  gospel 
of  energ}',  whose  prime  criterion  is  success.  It  has  been 
called  a  business  philosophy  which  demands  results;  a 
bread-and-butter  view  of  life  which  aims  at  consequences. 

I  In   short,   pragmatism   furnislies   a   sort   of  speculative  . 

l^  clearing-house  which  says  that  a  philosophic  theory  must 
Jiave  cash  value  and  be  true  if  it  works,  and  false  if 
it  fails.    Pragmatism  is  not  a  metaphysical  system,  but 
a  method  of  testing  systems.    Each  one  applies  the  test     p 
for  himself  and  chooses  that  which  best  suits  his  own    -J 
particular  case. 

At  the  first  glance  and  from  a  superficial  view  prag-  j 
matism  seems  a  philosophy  typical  of  the  land  of  the/ 
dollar.  But  it  is  more  than  that.  Besides  the  materialj 
factor  it  brings  in  the  personal.  As  a  doctrine  of  per- j 
sonalism  it  is  aggressive;  it  emphasizes  self-sufficingness 
as  against  self-surrender;  pragmatists  arc  literally  poets, 
makers,  they  contribute  to  truth,  enlarge  metaphysi- 
cal ^ealitJ^  This  is  the  doctrine  of  dynamism  which 
lies  at  the  bottom  of  the  movement  and  explains  the  oon- 
stanfrecurrence  to  the  temperamental  test,  tlie  formula 
of  feeling.  Pragmatic  truth  is  tnith  with  a  thrill  to  it; 
if  we  can  fed  that  our  theories  work,  we  can  have  the 

279 


280  PRAGMATISM 

most  intense  of  satisfactions, — that  of  personal  asser- 
tion. 
/        Personalism  plus  dynamism  is  the  formula  of  ag- 
y    gressive  pragmatism.    As  such  it  can  almost  be  called 
vAmericanism.    It  expresses  the  national  worship  of  the 
practical  inventor,  the  pushing  man  of  affairs.    But  here 
the  doctrine  broadens  into  wider  aspects.    Besides  the 
confidence  in  the  application  of  science  to  the  conquering 
of  nature,  the  winning  of  the  West  by  Yankee  inventions, 
there  is  the  ideal  of  democracy  as  a  reenforcing  factor. 
As  we  have  a  share  in  the  making  of  our  government,  so 
we  have  a  share  in  the  making  of  truth,  and,  provided 
the  principle  of  representation  be  given  proper  scope, 
there  arises  the  irresistible  might  of  united  personalities, 
all  having  their  say.    And  besides  this  sublimated  nation- 
/    alism  there  is  a  still  wider  horizon.    Pragmatism  becomes 
\  humanism.     In  his  collective  capacity  man  now  finds 
that  his"  fate  is  not  wholly  made  for  him  either  by 
mechanical  forces  or  by  supreme  powers.    In  the  high 
confidence  that  the  strong  will  win,   that  nothing  is 
-impossible  to  the  powerful,  he  comes  to  the  conclusion 
f     not  that  he  must  adapt  himself  to  environment,  but  that 
\     environment  must  adapt  itself  to  him.    In  a  word,  find- 
V   ing  the  world  so  plastic,  he  comes  to  believe  himself  no 
^longer  man,  but  super-man. 

As  personal,  dynamic,  human  and  superhuman,  prag- 
matism has  well-nigh  broken  bounds.    Let  us,  therefore, 
turn  back  and  trace  its  rise  in  the  land  of  its  birth. 
Hailed  as  a  typical  American  philosophy,  pragmatism 
has  had  three  phases  in  its  native  growth, — the  primitive 
of  Charles  Peirce,  the  developed  of  John  Dewey,  and 
' — 7 -the  radical  of  William  James.     In  this  triumvirate  of 
\  /   pragmatism  Peirce  taught  that  it  was  logical, — a  method 
A.    to  make  our  ideas  clear;   Dewey  taught  that   it  was^ 


THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  PRACTICALITY        281 

instrumental, — a  useful  tool  for  action;  James  taught  \ 
that  it  was  temperamental, — a  way  to  reach  personal  \ 
satisfaction.  Finally,  these  three  varieties  of  prag-- 
matism  had  different  applications.  The  first  tended 
be  solipsistic,  to  confine  itself  to  the  individual  and  his 
dou"ljts7~the  second  to  be_social^to  pass  over  the  bar- 
riers of  self;  thg_third_  lo_be  transcendental,  to  lea_B. 
beyond  human  barriersj^  to  reach^a  pluralistic  universe 
of  higher  powers,  earth-angels,  world-souls,  with  which 
man  may  have  intercourse._  In  order  of  time  pragmatism 
iFlprimitive,  or  developed,  or  radical.  In  its  point  of 
view  it  is  logical,  or  instrumental,  or  temperamental. 
In  its  application  it  is  solipsistic,  or  social,  or  tran- 
scendental. Of  these  three  varieties  let  us  now  take  up 
the  fii*st. 

Primitive  pragmatism  was  started  in  1878  by  Charles 
Peirce  as  a  logical  method  teaching  us  how  to  make 
our  ideas  clear.  Taking,  for  example,  the  rival  theories 
of  fatalism  and  free-will,  he  gave  this  as  a  maxim  to 
clear  up  metaphysics:  "  Consider  what  effects,  that 
might  eoneeivably  have  practical  bearings,  we  conceive 
the  object  of  our  conceptions  to  have.  Then,  our  con- 
ception of  these  effects  is  the  whole  of  the  conception  oi- 
the  object."  Such  is  the  mild  doctrine  which  souglit 
to  induce  reasonableness,  as  shown  in  becoming  governed 
by  laws,  becoming  instinct  with  general  ideas.  This 
doctrine  lay  neglected  for  twenty  years,  when  it  was 
revived  by  William  James  in  his  notable  California  Ad- 
dress of  1898.  In  this  James  added  a  personal  note  in 
remarking:  "  I  should  prefer  to  express  Peirce 's  pri 
ciple  by  saying  that  the  effective  meaning  of  any  philo- 
sophic proposition  can  always  bo  brought  down  to  some 
particular  consequence  in  our  future  practical  experi-_^, 
ence." 


(5^: 


282  PRAGMATISM 

The  pragmatic  seed  planted  by  Peirce  and  watered  by 
James  grew  rapidly  in  a  congenial  soil.  The  result  was 
the  Chicago  school,  whereby  Dewey  and  his  followers 
carried  the  doctrine  into  the  wide  fields  of  biological  and 
^ocial  adaptation.  The  primitive  formula  was  discovered 
[^  to  be  a  fundamental  law  of  growth,  the  vital  principle 
of  evolution  itself.  The  rule  of  logical  method,  inter- 
preted as  having  practical  bearings,  was  now  enlarged 
into  a  law  of  social  success.  The  principle  of  Peirce  in 
the  thirty  years  of  its  growth  had  gotten  out  of  hand. 
Such  growth  was  not  without  reason.  Transplanted 
from  the  East,  the  principle  flourished  because  of  a 
new  atmosphere,  the  adventurous  atmosphere  of  the 
West.  The  seed  and  the  soil  were  in  perfect  accord.  The 
new  principle,  interpreted  as  present  and  practical,  ap- 
pealed to  the  pioneer  who  sought  instant  success.  Here 
is  a  maxim  which  is  made  to  mean  simply  that  reason- 
ableness or  truth  is  due  to  practical  adjustment,  to  the 
choice  of  relations  which  work. 

Besides  practicality  and  workability  a  new  quality  is 
to  be  added.  It  is  that  of  risk.  For  the  sake  of  suc- 
TTess  one  is  willing  to  take  chances,  provided  he  is  left  to 
his  own  free  choice.  The  old  way  was  that  of  tradition. 
The  new  is  that  of  adventure.  No  dogma  is  accepted, 
no  teaching  received  at  second  hand.  We  must  find  out 
the  truth  for  ourselves.  What  will  work  for  me,  here 
and  now? — that  is  the  question  for  me  to  decide.  This 
is  the  spirit  of  the  pioneer  who  has  the  excitement  of 
exploring  a  land  as  yet  uncharted,  and  it  is  this  spirit 
which  brings  out  the  difference  between  the  old  and 
new  philosophies.  To  the  absolutist  the  world  is  like 
a  well-planned  city,  bound  to  develop  according  to 
preconceived  ideas.  To  the  pragmatist  the  world.isja^ 
world  in  the  making;  it  is  not  the  city  of  Washington, 


THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  PRACTICALITY        283 

but  the  wilderness  itself.  So  the  praginatist  leaves  the 
(lull  task  of  going  over  ground  mapped  out  by  another, 
and  seeks  the  pleasures  of  the  unexplored.  His  is  the 
thrill  of  discovery.  When  he  turns  his  canoe  into  the 
unknown  lake,  will  he  find  his  way  out  by  a  cataract  or 
a  carry?  He  does  not  want  to  know  beforehand.  He 
prefers  to  test  his  skill  and  his  strength  as  occasion  may 
arise.  Hjsjthis  spirit  of  thejinexpectcd  that  gives  point 
to  the  pragmatic  formula.  An  idea,  a  thing  may~br  may 
not  sueceednrnraynSe  true,  or  it  may  be  false.  I  may 
be  able  to  carry  my  canoe  to  the  next  water,  or  the      XkIU  \ 


cataract  may  upset  me.    My  plan  of  going  out  this  way —  J)  /  / 

n 


(' 


may  work,  or  it  may  not.  However,  I  am  paddling  my  /  (^L^ 
own  canoe ;  I  am  not  being  guided  by  another.  No  all-  ' 
knower  is  leading  me  by  the  blazed  trail  of  preestaU-  ' 
lished  harmony. 

Such   a   defense   is   all  very  well,   replies  the   anti- 
pragmatic  critic,  but  is  the  novice  apt  to  succeed?     Is 
there  not  woodcraft  and  forest  lore  to  be  learned  from 
the  guides?     Can  the  pragmatist  be  a  solipsist,  a  lone 
traveler  in  the  wilderness?    Does  he  not  need  the  knowl- 
edge of  others?  .  ,   .  Questions  like  these  led  from  primi- 
tive to  developed  pragmatism,  from  the  solipsistic  to  the  t 
social  stage.     Peirce  talked  like  a  pioneer,  some  Daniel        f'^'^Iuu^ 
Boone  of  metaphysics.    But  Dewey,  and  James  after  him,  ^  ^f 
acknowledged  that  the  successful  thinker  cannot  exist  i'        • 
alone  and  unaided  in  his  speculations.    There  is  a  treas-  i    yi/»^  • 
ure  of  past  experience, — the  accumulated  wisdom  of  his-*  /y^^ 
ancestors.     Su£h_are  the  axioms  which  are  accepted  as 
true  because  they  have  been  ever  found  to  work.    Our 
primitive  predecessors  did  the  first  exploring  in  the  un- 
mapped maze  of  knowledge;  they  found   that  certain 
human  ways  of  thinking  succeeded,  and  nature,  prt-serva- 
tive  of  all  successful  achievements,  handed  these  down  as 


284  PRAGMATISM 

habits  of  action.  These  are  not  dogmatic  first  prin- 
ciples, clear-cut  innate  ideas,  but  general  tendencies, 
natural  promptings,  instinctive  leadings.  Here  the 
hereditary  transmissive  factor  of  human  knowledge  ap- 
pears. The  solipsistic  empiricist  has  developed  into  the 
social  inheritor  of  funded  knowledge. 

It  is  because  of  this  sinking  fund  of  the  past  that 
Dewey,  the  evolutionist,  gives  a  real  cash  value  to  in- 
strumental truths.  They  pass  current,  not  merely  be- 
cause of  their  face  value,  but  because  of  their  intrinsic 
worth.  The  primitive  pragmatist,  like  the  early  pioneer, 
issued  wild-cat  currency;  but  with  the  developed  prag- 
matist a  mere  personal  promissory  note  was  not  enough. 
The  collateral  of  continuity  was  demanded  and  this  was 
supplied  by  the  evolutionist  with  his  doctrine  of  inherited 
tendencies.  In  a  word  the  Bank  of  Truth  was  founded 
long  ago. 

2.   Primitive  Pragmatism:  Charles  Peirce 

In  the  very  first  of  his  essays  called  "  Illustrations  of 
the  Logic  of  Science,"  Peirce  makes  a  statement  which 
contains  implicitly  the  three  phases  in  the  history  of  prag- 
matism,— the  logical,  the  instrumental,  the  temperamen- 
tal. Discussing  the  logic  of  science  he  says:  Logicality 
in  regard  to  practical  matters  is  the  most  useful  quality 
an  animal  can  possess.  ...  It  is  certainly  best  for  us 
that  our  beliefs  should  be  such  as  may  truly  guide  our 
actions  so  as  to  satisfy  our  desires. 

While  this  statement  might  have  a  threefold  meaning, 
might  furnish  grounds  for  all  the  later  developments 
of  the  movement,  such  is  not  its  intent.  The  method  of 
science,  continues  Peirce,  should  be  strictly  logical,  other- 
wise we  run  off  into  false  methods.    The  first  of  these 


PRIMITIVE  PRAGMATISM:  CHARLES  PEIRCE     285 

is  the  a  priori  method,  to  think  as  one  is  inclined  to 
think.  The  second  is  the  method  of  tenacity  where,  as 
soon  as  a  firm  belief  is  reached,  we  are  entirely  satisfied, 
whether  the  belief  be  true  or  false.  The  third  is  the 
method  of  authority  where  one  does  not  think  as  one 
is  inclined,  but  because  the  state  or  some  institution  so 
Avills. 

But  there  is  a  method  above  all  these, — it  is  that  of 
science.  It  is  not  the  method  of  the  individual  for  the 
sake  of  comfortable  conclusions.  It  is  not  the  method 
of  tenacity  held  to  by  society.  It  is  not  the  method  of 
authority,  governing  the  mass  of  mankind  and  leading 
to  the  path  of  peace.  No,  there  is  a  method  above  all 
these — above  the  individual,  or  society,  or  mankind  it- 
self. It  is  the  method  of  science  and  its  aim  is  the 
growth  of  reasonableness,  shown  in  becoming  governed 
by  laws,  becoming  instinct  with  general  ideas.  .  .  .  The 
test  of  whether  I  am  truly  following  the  method  is  not 
an  immediate  appeal  to  my  feelings  and  purposes,  but, 
on  the  contrary,  itself  involves  the  application  of 
that  method,  which  is  to  have  a  clear  logical  con- 
science. 

How  is  the  latter  obtained?  The  answer  is  given  in 
the  second  and  best  known  of  Peirce's  papers,  entitled 
"  How  to  Make  our  Ideas  Clear."  Before  we  attain  to 
the  cardinal  pragmatic  principle,  already  quoted,  there 
are  certain  preliminary  steps.  The  first  of  these  is  to 
emerge  from  conceptions  that  are  obscure  to  those  that  , 
are  clear,  by  means  of  belief.  And  what,  then,  is  belief  t  ' 
jtis_something  that  appeas£S-Lhc  irritation  of  (loui)t  and 
involves  the  establ ishment  in  our  nature  o f  the  rule  of 
action,  or  habit.  Now,  since  the  essence  of  a  belief  is 
the  establishment  of  a  habit,  different  beliefs  are  dis- 
tinguished by  the  different  modes  of  action  to  which  they 


286  PRAGMATISM 

give  rise.  For  example,  the  question  of  free-will  and 
fate  in  its  simplest  form  is  this:  I  have  done  something 
of  which  I  am  ashamed;  could  I,  by  an  effort  of  the 
will,  have  resisted  the  temptation  and  done  otherwise? 
The  answer  is  that,  if  I  had  willed  to  do  otherwise  than 
I  did,  I  should  have  done  otherwise,  and  that  contradic- 
tory results  would  follow  from  a  contrary  hypothesis. 
Thus  we  come  to  the  clearing  up  of  our  ideas  by  saying 
that  our  >  idea  of  anything  is  our  idea^  of  its  sensible 
effect,  and  thus,  finally,  we  reach  the  rule  for  attaining 
the  final  grade  of  clearness  and  apprehension,  namely, 
*'  Consider  what  effects,  that  might  conceivably  have 
//practical  bearing,  we  conceive  the  object  of  our  con- 
\  ception  to  have.  Then,  our  conception  of  these  effects  is 
the  whole  of  our  conception  of  the  object." 

Again  we  have  the  famous  principle  of  Peirce  around 
which  so  much  controversy  has  raged.  It^  is  rightly  in^ 
terpreted  to  mean  a  maxim  for  clearing  up  metaphysics. 
It  is  wrongly  interpreted  to  mean  a  mere  rule  of  action. 
Against  this  misinterpretation  of  the  principle  its  origi^ 
nator  protested.  He  held  that  the  principle  had  been 
carried  too  far  when  it  was  changed  from  one  of 
methodology  to  one  of  practicality.  In  criticism  of 
James,  who  asserted  that  beliefs  are  nothing  but  rules 
of  action,  Peirce  contended  that  such  doctrine  assumes 
that  the  end  of  man  is  action.  -He  added  that  this  stoical 
axiom  did  not  recommend  itself  so  forcibly  to  him  at 
the  age  of  sixty  as  it  did  at  thirty.  If  it  be  admitted, 
on  the  contrary,  that  action  wants  an  end,  and  that  that 
end  must  be  something  of  a  general  description,  then 
the  spirit  of  the  maxim  itself,  which  is  that  we  must  look 
to  the  upshot  of  our  concept  in  order  rightly  to  appre- 
hend them,  would  direct  us  towards  something  different 
from  practical  facts,  namely,  to  general  ideas,  as  the 


PRIMITIVE  PRAGMATISM:  CIIAKLKS  I'KIKCK     2S7 

true  interprctoi-s  of  our  thought.  .  .  .  This  niaxiiu  Kiuls 
to  clearness  of  thought,  furtlicrs  the  dcvclopmeut  of  cou- 
erete  reasonableness  so  that  the  meaning  of  a  concept 
does  not  lie  in  any  individual  reactions  at  all,  but  in  the 
manner  in  which  those  reactions  contribute  to  that  de- 
velopment. 

Few  interpreters  of  primitive  pragmatism  have  gone 
back  to  these  sources  and  shown  the  real  doctrine  of 
Peirce.  It  was  more  general  than  is  ordinarily  thought, 
and  also  far  less  selfish.  The  doctrine  is  one  called  by 
its  author  pragmaticism.  It  is  more  than  immediate 
empiricism ;  it  is  a  game  of  consequences  and  those  con- 
sequences the  most  remote.  In  a  word,  the  pragmatist  is 
willing  to  take  risks  in  order  to  attain  truth.  All  this 
is  brought  out  in  the  third  of  Peirce 's  essays,  "  The 
Doctrine  of  Chances."  In  this  it  is  held  that  a  man  con- 
not  be  logical  so  long  as  he  is  concerned  (inly  with  his 
own  fate,  for  the  chances  are  against  him  in  a  .short 
series  of  probabilities.  Therefore,  only  that  man  wlio 
should  care  equally  for  what  was  to  happen  in  all  pos- 
sible cases  could  act  logically, — sure  succcess  comes  only 
in  the  long  run.  It  may  seem  strange,  concludes  Peirce, 
that  I  should  put  forward  three  sentiments,  namely, 
interest  in  an  indefinite  community,  recognition  of  the 
possibility  of  this  interest  being  madt^  supreme,  and 
hope  in  the  unlimited  continuance  of  intellectual  activity, 
as  indispensable  requirements  jof  logic.  Yet,  when  we  |  hy-^ 
consider  thaUogic  d£penclsjin_a_-Diere .struggle  taescape    /    ^u- 

.J 


dojubtj   whieh_gs   it.  terminates   in    action.   mustj)egin 
in  emotion,  and  that,  furthermore,  the  gnjy_cause  7>T 
our  planting  ourselves  on  reason  is  that  other  methods 
of  escaping  (foubF  fail  on^cj^iiunt  of  tlie  social  impulse.    . 
why  should  vvi"  wonder  to  find  social  sentiment  presup-^ 
posed  in  reasoning? 


288  PRAGMATISM 

Such  is  primitive  pragmatism,  quite  different  from 
what  has  been  generally  thought.  Its  aim  is  less  selfish 
than  social,  its  spirit  less  practical  than  general.  For 
this  interpretation  we  have  the  word  of  Peirce  when  he 
further  insists  that  his  maxim  is  a  clarifying  maxim; 
and  that  even  reasonableness  is  not  a  good  in  itself  but 
only  an  aid  in  the  evolutionary  process.  But  the  primi- 
tive principle,  as  the  author  complains,  has  become 
"  transmogrified,"  (Reality,  according  to  present  prag- 
jnatism,  is  to  be  tested  by  immediacy ;  truth  to  be  found 

^    in  the  exigencies  of  practical  life.    The  search,  then,  is 

I       for  what  is  needed  and  useful.    In  a  word  the  test  of 

\      truth  is  success. 

\  For  this  interpretation  James  and  Dewey  are  jointly 
\  responsible.  The  former  enlarges  his  modification  of 
reirce's  principle  when  he  says:  ^n  methodology  it  is 
certain  that  to  trace  and  compare  their  respective  con- 
sequences is  an  admirable  way  of  establishing  the  differ- 
ing meanings  of  different  conceptions.  .  ,  .  The  mean- 
ing of  a  conception  expresses  itself  in  practical  con- 
sequences, either  in  the  shape  of  conduct  to  be 
recommended,  or  in  that  of  experience  to  be  expected^ 
In  like  manner  Dewey  enlarges  the  primitive  principle. 
At  first  his  problem  is  how  to  make  our  ideas  clear  to 
ourselves  and  how  to  get  out  of  them  their  cash  value; 
at  the  last  he  socializes  the  problem  and  turns  from 
commercialism  to  humanism.  So  we  have  next  to  show 
how  this  broadening  of  the  initial  principle  was  left  to 
the  Chicago  school,  and  how  that  fine  air  of  adventure 
was  applied  to  social  ethics, — to  the  search  for  practical 
principles  destined  to  bring  the  greatest  good  to  the 
greatest  number. 


THE  CHICAGO  SCHOOL:  JOHN  DEWEY       289 
3.   The  Chicago  School:  John  Dewey 

In  the  beginning  of  his  first  essay  on  "  Thought  and  its 
Subject-Matter"    Dewey    follows    in    the    footsteps    of 
Peirce.     The   latter  had   advocated  that  sort  of  logic 
which  would  appease  the  irritation  of  doubt  and  clear 
up  our  ideas.     So  Dewey  holds  that  reflective  thought 
has  as  the  measure  of  its  success  the  degree  in  which 
the  thinking  disposes  of  the  difficulty.    This  is  applied 
logic.    Against  it  the  advocates  of  pure  logic  bring  the  ) 
charge  that  it  cleals  merely  with  hindcaB<ieSi.and  with^ 
the  devices  for  overcoming  them.     Now,  the  absolutists 
disparage  such  considerations  of  utility,  because  they 
prefer  "  universal  forms  and  principles  of  thought  which 
hold   good    everywhere   irrespective   of   any    difference 
in  the  objects."    By  such  disparagement  the  reader  will 
readily  see  the  absolutists  cut  out  the  entire  procedure 
of  practical  deliberation  and  of  concrete  scientific  re- 
search.    And  in  their  preference  for  abstractions,  with- 
out possible  reference  or  bearing,  they  expose  the  weak- 
ness of  mere  metaphysics  in  the  sense  of  a  metaphysics 
which  makes  a  gulf  between  itself  and  science.     The 
pragmatic  method  is  different.    "What  we  have  to  reckon 
with  is  not  the  problem  of,  How  can  I  think  at  large  ?\ 
but,  How  shall  I  think  right  here  and  now  ?    The  various 
modes  of  conceding,  judging,  and  inferring  arc  to  be  , 
treated,  not  as  qualifications  of  thought  at  large,  but  of/ 
thought  engaged  in  its  specific,  most  economic,  effective' 
response  to  its  own  particular  occasion. 

We  have  here  reached  the  instrumental  type  of  think- 
ing. It  has  two  advantages.  Negatively,  it  wipes  out 
the  distinction  between  thought  and  fact,  the  bypothet- 
ical  chasm  between  pure  and  applied  logic  which  a  false 
metaphysics  created.    Positively,  it  falls  in  line  with  the 


290  PRAGMATISM 

evolutionary  process,  wherein  biology  and  social  history 
disclose  the  fact  that  every  distinct  organ,  structure,  or 
formation,  every  grouping  of  cells  or  elements,  has  to  be 
treated  as  an  instrument  of  adaptation  to  a  particular 
environing   situation. 

Dewey  thus  boldly  lays  down  the  platform  of  instru- 
mentalism.  In  pointing  out  its  negative  and  positive 
sides  we  may  suggest  that  it  is  finalh^  to  be  judged  by 
the  rule  of  Leibniz,  that  philosophers  are  not  so  much 
true  in  what  they  deny,  as  in  what  they  affirm.  This 
explains  why  the  absolutists  have  been  up  in  arms 
against  Dewey's  denials.  They  do  not  relish  his  bald 
dilemma,  namely,  that  we  have  no  choice,  save  either 
to  conceive  of  thinking  as  a  response  to  a  specific 
stimulus,  or  else  to  regard  it  as  something  "  in  it- 
self." But  are  we  left  to  this  bare  dilemma  be- 
tween Ci^sar  or  nobody?  When  Dewey  protests 
against  the  diremption  between  thought  and  things,  he 
is  protesting  against  a  false  transcendentalism  which 
would  put  a  line  of  cleavage  between  the  world  of  fancy 
and  the  world  of  fact.  His  own  solution  actually  ap- 
proaches a  true  transcendentalism,  being  a  species  of 
immanence,  a  marrying  of  thought  to  things.  Thus  he 
explains:  As  we  submit  each  characteristic  situation  of 
experience  to  our  gaze  we  find  it  has  a  dual  aspect.  In 
the  course  of  changing  experience  we  keep  our  balance, 
because,  wherever  there  is  thinking,  there  is  material  in 
question.  Now  the  old-style  logician  sets  the  agent  over 
against  the  externality  of  the  fact,  but  the  new  does  not 
keep  "  thought  in  itself  "  apart  from  the  limits  of  the 
special  work  it  has  to  do.  This  leads  to  the  value  of 
the  logic  of  experience.  Philosophy,  defined  as  such  a 
logic,  makes  no  pretense  to  be  an  account  of  a  closed  and 
finished  universe;  its  business  is  not  to  secure  or  guar- 


THE  CHICAGO  SCHOOL:  JOHN  DEWEY        291 

antee  any  particular  reality  or  value.  Ou  the  contrary, 
it  gets  the  significance  of  a  method.  The  right  relation- 
ship, the  adjustment  of  the  various  typical  phases  of 
experience  to  one  another,  is  a  problem  felt  in  every  de- 
partment of  life.  Intellectual  control  of  these  adjust- 
ments cannot  fail  to  reflect  itself  in  an  added  clearness 
and  security  on  the  practical  side.  .  .  .  The  value  of 
research  for  social  progress;  the  bearing  of  psychology 
upon  educational  procedure;  the  mutual  relations  of 
fine  and  industrial  art;  the  question  of  the  extent  and 
nature  of  specialization  in  science  in  comparison  with 
the  claims  of  applied  science;  the  adjustment  of  religious 
aspirations  to  scientific  statements — such  are  a  few  of 
the  many  social  questions  jwhose„^jaZ_ans>ver  ^depends 
upon  the  possession  and_use  of  a  general  logic  of  experi- 
ence  as  a  method  of  inquiiy  and  of  interpretation. 

Of  all~these^suggested  reforms  Dewey  has  earrieil  out 
most  successfully  a  combination  of  the  first  two,  namely, 
social  progress  and  educational  procedure.  Through  his 
work  in  connection  with  the  Laboratory  School,  exist- 
ing in  Chicago  between  1896  and  1003.  his  ideas  attained 
such  concreteness  as  comes  from  embodiment  and  testing 
in  practice.  The  problem  is  considered  to  be  one  of 
instrumental  logic,  the  application  of  thought  to  things. 
The  usual  school  has  been  so  set  apart,  he  explains,  so 
isolated  from  the  ordinary  conditions  and  motives  of 
life,  that  the  place  where  children  are  sent  for  discipline 
is  the  one  place  in  the  world  where  it  is  most  difficult 
to  get  such  experience.  Contrast  with  this  the  old  days 
when  the  household  was  practically  the  center  in  which 
were  carried  on  all  the  typical  forms  of  industrial  occu- 
pation. The  clothing  worn  was  not  only  n>ade  in  the 
house,  but  the  members  of  the  household  were  generally 
familiar  with  the  shearing  of  the  sheep,  the  carding  and 


292  PRAGMATISM 

spinning  of  the  wool,  and  the  plying  of  the  loom.  In 
short,  the  entire  industrial  process  stood  revealed,  from 
the  production  on  the  farm  of  the  raw  materials,  till 
the  finished  article  was  actually  put  into  use.  Not  only 
this,  but  practically  every  member  of  the  household  had 
his  o\Mi  share  in  the  work.  The  children,  as  they  gained 
in  strength  and  capacity,  were  gradually  initiated  into 
the  mysteries  of  the  several  processes.  It  was  a  matter 
of  immediate  and  personal  concern  even  to  the  point 
of  actual  participation.  Such  was  the  old  household 
sj^stem  which  furnished  an  intimate  acquaintance  with 
nature  at  first  hand,  with  real  things  and  materials,  with 
the  actual  processes  of  their  manipulation,  and  the 
knowledge  of  their  social  necessities  and  uses. 

In  contrast  jwith  this,  consider  the  school  of  the  pres- 
ent dayywhich  appeals,fmLlh£jti^^  simply  to  the 
intellectual  aspect  of  our  natures,  ^ourdesire  to  learn,  to 
accumulate  information,  and  to  get  control^f  the  syin- 
bols  of  learningj^o^jo^urjmpulses  and  t£ndencies  to 
make,  to  do,  to  create,  to  produce,  jyhether  in  tjie_fgrm 
of  utility  or  of  art.  Against  this  conventional  mod- 
ern conception,^  which  is  merely  a  survival  of  a  false 
medievalism,  the  age  revolts.  One  of  the  most  striking 
tendencies  at  present  is  toward  the  introduction  of  so- 
called  manual  "  training,"  shop-work,  and  the  house- 
hold arts — sewing  and  cooking.  This  has  not  been  doiie 
' '  on  purpose, ' '  with  a  full  consciousness  that  the  school 
must  now  supply  that  factor  of  training  formerly  taken 
care  of  in  the  home,  but  rather  by  instinct,  by  experi- 
menting and  finding  that  such  work  takes  a  vital  hold 
of  pupils  and  gives  them  something  which  was  not  to 
be  got  in  any  other  way.  Consciousness  of  its  real  im- 
port is  still  so  weak  that  the  w^ork  is  often  done  in  a 
half-hearted,  confused,  and  unrelated  way.     The  rea- 


THE  CHICAGO  SCHOOL:  JOHN  DEWEY        293 

sons  assigned  to  justify  it  are  painfully  inadequate  or 
sometimes  even  positively  wrong. 

Can  we  give  actual  reasons  for  what  rouj^'hly  may 
be  termed  the  "  new  "  education?  It  is  useless  to  be- 
moan the  departure  of  the  good  old  days  of  children's 
modesty,  reverence,  and  implicit  obedience,  if  we  expect 
merely  by  bemoaning  and  by  exhortation  To  bring  them 
back.  It  is  radical  conditions  which  have  changed,  and 
only  an  equally  radical  change  in  education  suffices.  In 
the  centurj'  of  changes  between  the  household  and 
factory  systems  one  can  hardly  believe  there  has  been  a 
revolution  in  all  history  so  rapid,  so  extensive,  so  com- 
plete. Through  it  the  face  of  the  earth  is  making  over, 
even  as  to  its  physical  forms;  political  boundaries  are 
wiped  out  and  moved  about,  as  if  they  were  indeed  only 
lines  on  a  paper  map;  population  is  hurriedly  gathered 
into  cities  from  the  ends  of  the  earth;  habits  of  living 
are  altered  with  startling  abruptness  and  thoroughness ; 
the  search  for  the  truths  of  nature  is  infinit»'ly  stimu- 
lated and  facilitated  and  their  application  to  life  made 
not  only  practicable,  but  commercially  necessarj'. 

Such  conditions,  continues  Dewey,  mean  much  to  the 
city-bred  child  of  to-day.  For  example,  the  now  geog- 
raphy is  not  merely  the  study  of  metes  and  bounds, 
but  the  earth  as  the  great  field,  the  great  mine,  the  great 
source  of  the  energies  of  heat,  light,  and  electricity ;  the 
great  scene  of  ocean,  stream,  mountain,  and  plain,  of 
which  all  our  agricultural  and  mining  and  lumbering, 
all  our  manufacturing  and  distributing  agencies,  too, 
are  but  the  partial  elements  and  factors.  So.  too,  the  new 
manual  training  is  not  merely  utilitarian  like  sewing  on 
buttons  or  making  patches.  Looked  at  from  the  proper 
genetic  point  of  view,  we  find  that  this  work  gives  the 
point  of  departure  from   whi<-h  tln'  ehild  can  begin  to 


294  PRAGMATISM 

follow  the  progress  of  mankind  in  history,  getting  an 
insight  also  into  the  materials  he  is  using  and  the 
mechanical  principles  involved.  In  connection  with 
these  occupations,  the  historic  development  of  man  is 
recapitulated.  For  example,  the  children  are  first  given 
the  raw  material — the  flax,  the  cotton  plant,  the  wool 
as  it  comes  from  the  back  of  the  sheep.  .  .  .  Then  a 
study  is  made  of  these  materials  from  the  standpoint 
of  their  adaptation  to  the  uses  to  which  they  may  be 
put.  For  instance,  a  comparison  of  the  cotton  fiber 
with  wool  fiber  is  made.  I  did  not  know  until  the  chil- 
dren told  me,  that  the  reason  for  the  late  development 
of  the  cotton  industry  as  compared  with  the  woolen  is, 
that  the  cotton  fiber  is  so  very  difficult  to  free  by  hand 
from  the  seeds.  The  children  in  one  group  worked  thirty 
minutes  freeing  cotton  fibers  from  the  boll  and  the  seeds 
and  succeeded  in  getting  out  less  than  one  ounce.  They 
could  easily  believe  that  one  person  could  only  gin  one 
pound  a  day  by  hand,  and  could  understand  why  their 
ancestors  wore  woolen  instead  of  cotton  clothing.  .  .  . 
They  then  followed  the  processes  necessary'  for  working 
the  fibers  up  into  cloth.  They  re-invented  the  first  frame 
for  carding  the  wool — a  couple  of  boards  with  sharp 
pins  in  them  for  scratching  it  out.  They  redevised  the 
simplest  process  for  spinning  the  wool — a  pierced  stone 
or  some  other  weight  through  which  the  wool  is  passed, 
and  which  as  it  is  twirled  draws  out  the  fiber,  next  the 
top,  which  was  spun  on  the  floor,  while  the  children 
kept  the  wool  in  their  hands  until  it  was  gradually  dra^vn 
out  and  wound  upon  it.  Then  the  children  are  intro- 
duced to  the  invention  next  in  historic  order,  working 
it  out  experimentally,  thus  seeing  its  necessity,  and 
tracing  its  effects,  not  only  upon  that  particular  indus- 
try,  but  upon  modes  of  social  life — in  this  way  passing 


THE  CHICAGO  SCHOOL:  JOHN  DEWEY        295 

in  review  the  entire  process  up  to  the  present  complete 
loom,  and  all  that  goes  with  the  application  of  science  in 
the  use  of  our  present  available  powers.  I  need  not 
speak  of  the  science  involved  in  this — the  study  of  the 
fibers,  of  geographical  features,  the  conditions  under 
which  raw  materials  are  grown,  the  great  centers  of 
manufacture  and  distribution,  the  physics  involved  in 
the  machinery  of  production;  nor,  again,  of  the  his- 
torical side — the  influence  which  these  inventions  have 
had  upon  humanity.  .  .  .  Now,  what  is  true  of  this  one 
instance  of  fibers  used  in  fabrics,  is  true  in  its  measure 
of  every  material  used  in  every  occupation,  and  of  the 
processes  employed.  The  occupation  supplies  the  child 
with  a  genuine  motive;  it  gives  him  experience  at  first 
hand ;  it  brings  him  into  contact  with  realities.  It  does 
all  this,  but  in  addition  it  is  liberalized  throughout  by 
translation  into  its  historic  values  and  scientific  equiva- 
lences. It  ceases  with  the  growth  of  the  child's  mind 
in  power  and  knowledge  to  be  a  pleasant  occupation 
merely,  and  becomes  more  and  more  a  medium,  an  in- 
strument, an  organ — and  is  thereby  transformed. 

From  the  accomplishments  of  Dewey's  Laboratory' 
School  we  may  deduce  the  platform  of  the  Chicago 
grotrp.  'XrEe  a  literal  platform  it  may  be  looked  at 
from  four  sides.  First,  it  is  genetic:  it  does  not  recog- 
nize "  an  object  of  thought  in  itself,"  but  only  a  scries 
of  values,  which  vary  with  the  varj'ing  functions  to 
which  they  belong.  Next,  it  is  instrumental :  it  looks 
upon  the  notion  of  thought  as  an  immanent  tool,  as  a 
scaffolding  which  is  an  integral  part  to  the  very  opera- 
tion of  building.  Again,  it  is  .social:  it  seeks  for  a 
clear  and  comprehensive  consensus  of  public  conviction, 
and  a  consequent  concentrated  and  economical  direction 
of  effort.     Finally,   it   is  empirical:   there   is   no   pure 


296  PRAGMATISM 

thought  as  such,  nothing  real  which  is  not  a  direct  matter 
of  experience. 

Let  us  see  what  these  four  points  are  worth.  As  usual 
the  positive  are  strongest.  First,  as  genetic,  pragmatism 
allies  itself  with  evolutionism  and  has  behind  it  all  the 
force  of  that  movement;  its  cardinal  doctrine  is  adapta- 
tion to  environment,  for  knowing  is  a  function  in  the 
process  of  adjustment.  Next,  as  instrumental,  it  allies 
itself  with  the  new  methods  of  science,  it  adapts  tool 
to  material,  reconstructs  conflicting  experiences.  The 
thinker,  like  the  carpenter,  is  at  once  stimulated  and 
checked  in  every  stage  of  his  procedure  by  the  particular 
situation  which  confronts  him ;  materials,  price  of  labor, 
credit  at  the  bank — all  are  varying  factors  demanding 
constant  readjustment.  This  instrumental  adaptability 
seems  the  stronger  of  the  positive  points.  As  scientific 
it  passes  over  from  the  pure  to  the  applied,  by  showing 
the  relation  of  the  two.  As  James  interprets  it :  .In 
instrumentalism  a^Jact  an.d  -a.  theory  have  not  different^ 
natures,  as  is  usually  supposed^the-OJie,  Jbeing  objective,. 
■  ^  the  other  subjective ;  they  are  both  made  of  the  same 
/^v.  material,  ex£erience-material_^amely,  and  their  differ- 
ence ^relates  to  their  way  of  functioning  solelyx  i-t-is 
"fact"  when  it  functions  steadily;  it  is  *' theory!' 
when  we  hesitatj., 

Again,  as  social,  pragmatism  allies  itself  with  the 
broader  movement  known  as  humanism:  The  individual 
and  immediate  are  marks  of  ordinary  human  endeavor; 
whereas  the  general  and  remote  are  marks  of  abstract 
speculators  dwelling  apart  from  the  mass  of  mankind. 
.  .  .  These  statements  are  rather  vague  and  indefijiite ; 
so  is  the  social  programme  of  the  pragmatist.  Indeed 
Dewey  has  overloaded  his  platform  and  has  practically 
carried  out  only  the  first  of  his  proposals, — the  appliea- 


THE  CHICAGO  SCHOOL:  JOHN  DEWEl  '^ 

tion   of   genetic   psychology   to   odiieational    pn 
But  if  this  side  of  the  phitform  remains  unfinis 
last  does  not.     As  immediately  empirical,  praj 
puts  a  strong  barrier  against  absolutism.     Uptjn   t„ir, 
barrier  Dewey  has  lavished  his  greatest  labor:   Prag- 
matism,   empiricism,   humanism,   functionalism,    call    it 
what  you  will,  needs  no  unknowable,  no  ab.solute,  behind 
it  or  around  the  finite  world ;  no  absolute,  cither,  in  the 
sense  of  anything  eternally  constant,   for  no  term  is 
static,  but  cverj'thing  in  process  and  change.     In  like 
spirit  Dewey  has  carried  out  the  controversy  in  his  more 
recent  essays.    The  reason,  he  explains,  that  pragmatism 
has  no  use  for  a  perfect,  absolute,  complete,  finished 
thought  is  that  the  facts  of  life  arc  crude,  raw,  unor- / 
ganized,  brute.  / 

We  take  this  to  be  the  crux  of  the  matter.  Truth  does 
not  consist  in  conformity  or  correspondence  with  an 
externally  fixed  archetype  or  model,  but  is  in  process  of 
formationUke  all  other  things.  In  a  worTT  "  Truth  ^^ 
is  not  something  in  the  heavens,  apart  from  man,  mys-  ^ 
terious    and    incomprehensible    save    to    the    inspired ; 


but _  rather  an  empirical  reality  given  to  ever^'^  map. 
Such,  at  least,  seems  to  be  the  import  of  the  cryptic 
saying,  "  Anything,  everything,  are  what  they  arc  ex- 
perienced as."  This  is  the  postulate  of  mere  empiricism 
as  expanded  in  the  first  of  the  essays  after  the  Chicago 
studies.  The  empiricist,  continues  the  author,  when  he 
talks  of  experience  does  not  mean  .some  grandiose,  re- 
mote affair  that  is  cast  like  a  net  around  a  succession  of, 
fleeting  experiences;  he  doca. jiot  .mean  an  indefinite, 
total,  comprehensive  .cxpe-ri^aw  whi(»h-9omehow  engir- 
dle^an  endless  flux;  he  means  that  thingf:  are  what  they 
are  experienced  to  be,  and  that  every  experience  is  some 
thing.    .    .    .   From  this  postulate  of  empiricism,  as  a 


,'\<\X( 


c\^ 


298  PRAGMATISM 

general  concept,  nothing  can  be  deduced,  not  a  single 
philosophic   proposition.     But  the  real  significance  of 
the  principle  is  that  of  a  method  of  philosophical  an- 
alysis— a  method   identical   in  kind    (but   differing  in 
problem  and  hence  in  operation)  with  that  of  the  scien- 
p'tists.    If  you  wish  to  find  out  what  subjective,  objective, 
\   physical,  mental,  cosmic,  psychic — any  philosophic  term, 
in  short — means,  go  to  experience  and  see  what  the  thing 
vt_4s  experienced  as.     Such  a  method  is  not  spectacular; 
it  permits  of  no  offhand  demonstrations  of  God,  free- 
dom, immortality,  nor  of  the  exclusive  reality  of  mat- 
ter, or  ideas,  or  consciousness.     But  it  supplies  a  way 
I     of  telling  what  all  these  terms  mean.    It  may  seem  in- 
fSignlBcant,  or  chillingly  disappointing,  but  only  to  one 
i  who  will  not  try  it. '  Philosophic  concepts  have  outlived 
A  I  their  usefulness  considered  as  stimulants  to  emotion,  or 
\p^    I   as  a  species  of  sanctions ;  and  a  larger,  more  fruitful,  and 
\  more  valuable  career  awaits  them  considered  as  specific- 
\ally  experienced  meanings. 

We  notice  at  this  juncture  how  Dewey  has  outdone 
'•^^  Peirce;  how  the  principle  of  cool   reasonableness  has 

developed  into  the  cultivation  of  cold  reason.  //But  in 
adding  that  all  existence  is  direct  and  vital,  we  may 
ask  if  the  author  has  not  carried  the  matter  to  extremes. 
^  j^v     /Philosophic  principles,  especially  the  great  triad  of  God, 
''\^       J  freedom,  and  immortality,  are  wont  to  be.expM£rienced  as 
:  emotional  and  thus  we"  find  them  interpreted  by  William 
James.;/  It  is  the  mystic  strain  in  the  temperamental 
pragmatist  of  Cambridge  that  makes  him  follow  the  old 
saying  that  the  heart  has  reasons  that  the  reason  knows 
^not  of.     It_ would  be  a  more  generous  view  of  life  to 
utilize  the  sanctions  ^'sentiment.     But  for  such  sanc- 
tions the  Chicago  pragmatist  has  little  use.     He  is  an 
iconoclast  of  beliefs  that  transcend  his  method.     The 


THE  CHICAGO  SCHOOL:  JOHX  DEWF.Y        299 

contrast  is  clear.     James  is  the  proiiioti  r  of  tlio  will  to^ 
believe,  Dewey  of  the  reason  to  believe.     He  holds  that 
knowledge  as  science  is  the  outcome  of  systematically 
directed  inquiry,  not  submissive  aoceptanee  of  "  reality  " 
as  ready-made,  fixed,  and  of  finished  form. 

This  was  the  position  taken  in  1905  when  the  war  was 
carried  into  the  enemy's  countrj'.  In  Emerson  Hall  it- 
self, in  the  very  building  dedicated  to  the  chief  of  our 
absolutists,  Dewey,  as  President  of  the  American  Philo- 
sophical Association,  delivered  his  Cambridge  address 
on  "  Beliefs  and  Existences."  In  general  tiie  address 
w^as  an  attack  on  conventionalism,  and  an  assertion  of 
personalism.  There  was  about  it  a  Western  air  of  inde- 
pendence and  the  whole  w^is  bathed  in  the  atraosplu'rc 
of  the  adventurous.  The  modern  age,  it  explained,  is 
marked  by  a  refusal  to  be  satisfied  with  the  postpone- 
ment of  the  exercise  and  function  of  reason  to  another 
and  supernatural  sphere,  and  by  a  resolve  to  practice 
itself  upon  its  present  object,  nature,  with  all  its  joys. 
Instead  of  taking  an  oath  of  allegiance  to  Reality,  ob- 
jective, universal,  complete,  it  prefers  home  rule,  the 
gallantry  of  adventure,  the  genuineness  of  the  incom- 
plete. Instead  of  the  prevalent  academic  philosophy  of 
passionless  imperturbability,  absolute  detachment,  it 
prefers  need,  uncertainty,  choice,  novelty,  strife.  Now 
beliefs  are  personal  affairs  and  personal  alfairs  are  ad- 
ventures ;  for  the  world  has  meaning  as  somebody 's.  some- 
body's  at  a  juncture  taken  for  better  or  worse,  and  you 
shall  not  have  completed  your  metaphysics  till  yoii  have 
told  whose  world  is  meant  and  how  and  what  for— in 
what  bias  and  to  what  effect. 

It  is  strange  how  this  call  to  independency,  this  chal- 
lenge to  originality  resembles  the  first  address  of  Emer- 
son,  in   this   very   spot,   a   generation   before.     "  Why 


300  PRAGMATISM 

should  not  we  also  enjoy  an  original  relation  to  the 
universe?  "  asks  the  transcendentalist.  "  Why  should 
not  we  have  a  philosophy  of  insight  and  not  of  tradition  ? 
Why  should  we  grope  among  the  dry  bones  of  the  past 
when  nature's  floods  of  life  stream  around  and  through 
us?  "  Here  is  one  of  those  curious  points  of  resem- 
blance at  the  beginnings  of  important  movements  of 
thought.  Emerson  was  addressing  the  younger  genera- 
tion, protesting  against  the  dominance  of  the  dogmatic 
realism  of  the  Scotch  school  with  its  short  cut  of  common 
fv  $  sense.    And  so,  in  turn,  the  pragmatist  protests  against 

f       Kv     tJie  continuance  of  that  ancient  tradition  which  lasted  on 


y&iii' 


•       V  D^  the  Greek  influence  upon   our  local  architecture. 

jM!^     *^     Thus  is  the  classic  spirit  again  met  with  the  romantic, 

^^jiiM     '    the     conventions     and     unities     with     unconventional 

pluralism;   universals,   axioms,    and    a    priori    truths 

i.       with     the    trials    and    errors    of    struggling    human 

beings. 

While  the  old  conflict  is  repeated,  the  effective  forces 
are  new.  Modern  biology,  psychology,  and  the  social 
sciences,  continues  Dewey,  proffer  an  imposing  body  of 
concrete  facts  that  point  to  the  interpretation  of  knowl- 
edge as  a  human  and  practical  outgrowth  of  personal 
belief.  The  testimony  of  biology  is  that  the  organic 
instrument  of  the  whole  intellectual  life,  the  sense  or- 
gans and  brain  and  their  connections,  have  been  de- 
veloped on  a  definitely  practical  basis  and  for  practical 
aims,  for  the  purpose  of  such  control  over  conditions 
as  will  sustain  and  vary  the  meanings  of  life.  The  testi- 
mony of  psychology  is  that  sensation  and  perception, 
have  a  motor,  not  a  static  meaning.  The  testimony  of 
the  historic  sciences  is  that  knowledge  as  a  system  of 
information  and  instruction  is  a  cooperative  social 
achievement,  and  that  logical  thinking  is  a  reweaving 


THE  CHICAGO  SCHOOL:  JOHN  DKWKV        'Ml 

tlirougli  individual  activity  t)t'  the  social  lahric  at  such 
points  as  are  indicated  by  prevailing  need  and  aims. 

In  this,  his  Presidential  Address,  Dewey  gives  us  the 
clearest  statement  of  his  creed;  at  the  same  time  he 
leaves  us  with   an  unanswered  problem   which  James 
previously  designated  as  the  gap  in  the  Chicago  system. 
There  is  no  cosmolog5^     Granted  that  logical  thinking 
is  a  reweaviug  through  individual  activity  of  the  social 
fabric,  can  the  same  be  said  of  the  cosmic  fabric?     In 
social  advancement,  such  as  the  making  of  a  state  con- 
stitution or  the  improving  of  a  city,  we  may  acknowledge 
that  the  web  is  woven  as  we  go.    But  does  this  hold  good 
of  the  ampler  life,  especially  of  that  shining  appari- 
tion we  call  nature?     If  thought,  as  Dewey  elsewhere 
says,  is  a  reorganizing  power  because  it  is  a  vital  func- 
tion,— of  what,  we  ma}^  ask,  is  it  a  function?    "We  may 
dismiss  the  account  of  the  static  absolutist  that  there  ii> 
some  eternal  pattern  after  which  the  daily  pattern  is 
woven.    But  does  this  mean  that  the  only  process  is  one 
of  a  stitch  at  a  time,  and  that  the  resulting  fabric  has 
often  to  be  unraveled  because  faulty  and  imperfoct? 
At  times  the  pragmatist  seems  content  with  such  a  nar- 
row empiricism.    He  appeals  to  "  plain,  ordinary,  ever}'- 
day  empirical  reflections,  operating  as  centers  of  inquiry, 
of  suggestion,  of  experimentation."    At  otlier  times  he 
seems  inclined  towards  the  wider  sweep  of  rationalism; 
not  the  wholly  at  large  view  of  the  absolutist,  but  "  regu- 
lation "   in    an    "  auspicious  "   direction,   tested    ideas 
which  perform  a  "  recurrent  "  function.    These  admi.s- 
sions  appear  to  furnish  what  James  calls  the  real  safe- 
guard against  the  caprice  of  statement  and  indetermina- 
tion  of  belief,  that  "  grain  "  in  things  against  which  we 
cannot  practically  go.    It  is  doubtful  if  Dewey  acknowl- 
edges this  grain,  for  in  a  further  essay  on  "  Experience 


302  PRAGMATISM 

and  Objective  Idealism  "  he  distinctly  favors  subjective 
experience.  Of  human  arrangements  and  institutional- 
izations he  claims  that  their  value  is  experimental,  not 
fixedly  ontological;  law  and  order  are  good  things,  but 
not  when  they  become  rigidity  and  create  mechanical 
uniformity  or  routine. 

In  these  passages  there  is  raised  the  old  controversy  be- 
tween the  doctrines  of  being  and  becoming,  of  fate  and 
free-will,  of  fixity  and  chance.  The  controversy  is  diffi- 
cult, yet  in  its  discussion  it  is  clear  that  there  are  two 
positions  which  Dewey  does  not  take.  He  is  opposed  to 
the  Humean  skepticism  which  regards  experience  as  a 
chance  association,  by  merely  psychic  connections,  of  in- 
dividualistic states  of  consciousness.  He  is  also  opposed 
to  that  objective  idealism  which  gives  the  semblance  of 
order,  system,  connection,  mutual  reference,  to  sensory 
data  that  without  its  assistance  are  mere  subjective 
flux.  He  stands,  then,  between  two  extremes, — solip- 
sism, or  that  form  of  individualism  which  makes  one 
man's  meat  another  man's  poison;  and  absolutism,  which 
cramps  humanity  into  the  procrustean  bed  of  precon- 
ceived ideas.  No,  Dewey  leaves  humanity  to  make  its 
own  bed,  and  if  it  is  uncomfortable,  to  make  it  over 
again. 

But  if  life  is  not  a  mere  kaleidoscope  of  shifting 
events,  how  far  can  we  count  on  any  teleological  ele- 
ment, any  plan  or  purpose  in  it  ?  To  this  question  Dewey 
gives  a  twofold  answer.  As  to  immediate  empiricism 
he  asserts  that  it  is  not  solipsistic,  because  that  would 
put  all  error  in  the  individual  consciousness;  nor  is  it 
absolutistic,  because  that  would  put  all  truth  in  the  su- 
preme consciousness;  but  it  is  humanistic  because  it 
puts  both  error  and  truth  in  human  knowledge.  This 
answer  is  safe  and  sane,  but  is  it  satisfactory?    Not  to 


THE  CHICAGO  SCHOOL:  JOHN  DEWEY        303 

the  metaphysician  who  would  go  beyond  liuinan  con- 
sciousness for  a  deeper  answer  to  the  problem.  I'rag- 
matism  claims  to  be  naturalistic.  So  it  is,  provided  the 
word  nature  be  confined  to  human  nature.  But  what 
of  that  immensely  wider  environment  in  which  man  is 
set?  Is  there  a  "  grain  "  in  things  against  which  we 
cannot  go,  a  "  system  "  in  the  cosmic  game  of  chance 
against  which  we  cannot  win?  Of  the  two  main  mean- 
ings of  chance  Dewey  avoids  the  one,  but  does  not  grap- 
ple with  the  other.  There  is  the  popular  sense  in. which 
chance  means  a  capricious  and  incomprehensible  con- 
tingency. There  is  another  sense ;  namely,  that  of  a  hid- 
den but  discoverable  thread  of  connection.  To  the 
Greek  it  is  the  thread  which  the  Fates  spin;  to  the 
gambler  it  is  the  "  system  "  by  which  he  tries  to  break 
the  bank;  to  the  scientist  it  is  the  mathematical,  pre- 
dictable element  in  the  flux  of  events,  that  function 
which  appears  as  a  constant,  provided  the  series  be  suffi- 
ciently prolonged.  Blind  chance,  the  scientist  hates  it ; 
like  Galileo  he  exclaims:  "  Vanish,  ye  dark  vaults  of 
heaven!  " 

Even  here  there  is  a  distressing  dilemma.  Shall  we 
say  that  there  is  a  plan,  but  it  passes  man's  understand- 
ing ;  or  that  there  is  no  plan,  but  the  nature  of  things  is 
a  purposeless  flux?  As  to  the  former  view  the  prag- 
matist  demurs.  Like  a  good  Yankee  he  "  wants  to 
know."  As  to  the  latter  view  there  is  some  uncer- 
tainty. Primitive  pragmatism  has  been  interpreted  by 
Bakewell  and  others  as  a  latter-day  flowing  philosophy, 
a  revival  of  the  ancient  doctrine  of  Iloraclcitus.  that  man 
cannot  dip  into  the  same  river  twice.  Such  interpreters 
also  give  us  the  choice  between  Protagoras  and  Plato; 
between  man  as  the  measure  of  all  things,  and  man 
as    the    interpreter    of   nature    in    the    .sense   of   read- 


304  PRAGMATISM 

ing  its  secrets.  Of  the  latter  school  is  Emerson,  while 
Royce  continues  the  talc  in  the  World  and  the  Indi- 
vidual. 

What  is  the  broader  relation  of  these  two  views  ?  We 
fail  to  see  that  Dewey  has  grappled  with  the  problem. 
Given  functional  empiricism  and  thought  as  the  vital 
function,  what  is  the  immanent  principle  at  work?  Is 
it  humanistic  or  cosmic?  Is  it  confined  to  civic  com- 
munities, or  can  a  Greater  Chicago  school  take  in  the 
cosmos  as  a  suburb  ?  The  answer  is  not  yet  given.  In  a 
strictly  up-to-date  simile  Dewey,  as  upholder  of  the  voli- 
tional, disparages  Absolute  Reason.  Did  purpose  ride 
in  a  cosmic  automobile  toward  a  predestined  goal,  he 
exclaims,  it  would  not  cease  to  be  physical  and  mechani- 
cal because  labeled  Divine  Idea,  or  Perfect  Reason. 
However,  we  may  query  whether  human  reason  is  the 
immanent  motor  or  whether  it  is  merely  the  speed  indi- 
cator in  the  great  machine. 

Let  us  point  mit  plainly  what  Dewey  has  accomplished 
and  what  remains  to  be  done.  In  place  of  the  old- 
fashioned  objective,  idealism, svdiich  has  grown  somewhat 
stiff  in  the  joints,  he  has  put  a  volitional,  experimental 
spirit  which  is  willing  to  take  risks,  ready  to  adapt  itself 
to  new  environments.  For  such  a  volitional,  experi- 
mental teleology  he  claims  a  higher  ideality  than  is  pos- 
sessed by  idealism  itself.  Values,  he  insists,  cannot  be 
both  ideal  and  given,  and  their  "  given  "  character  is 
emphasized,  not  transformed  when  they  are  called  eter- 
nal and  absolute.  But  natural  values  become  ideal  the 
moment  their  maintenance  is  dependent  upon  the  inten- 
tional activities  of  an  empirical  agent. 

To  uphold  this  view  of  his  Dewey  has  final  recourse  to 
Darwinism.  In  laying  hands  upon  the  sacred  ark  of 
absolute  permanency,  in  treating  the  forms  that  had 


THE  CHICAGO  SCHOOL:  JOHN  DEWEY       305 

been  regarded  as  types  of  fixity  and  perfection  as  ori^'i- 
nating  and  passing  away,  the  Origin  of  Species,  he  tells 
us,  introduced  a  mode  of  thinking  that  in  the  end  was 
bound  to  transform  the  logic  of  knowledge  and  hence 
the  treatment  of  morals,  politics,  and  religion.  Here 
the  touchstone  was  the  old  problem  of  design  versus 
chance,  mind  versus  matter,  as  the  causal  explanation, 
tirst  or  final,  of  things.  The  classic  notion  was  that 
within  natural  sensible  events  there  is  contained  a  spirit- 
ual causal  force  which  as  spiritual  escapes  perception, 
but  is  apprehended  by  an  enlightened  reason.  The  Dar- 
^vinian  principle  of  natural  selection  cuts  straight  under 
this  philosophy.  If  all  organic  adaptations  are  due  sim- 
ply to  constant  variation  and  elimination  of  those  varia- 
tions harmful  in  that  struggle  for  existence  that  is 
brought  about  by  excessive  reproduction,  there  is  no  call 
for  a  prior  intelligent  causal  force  to  plan  and  pre- 
ordain them. 

"We  have  here  the  familiar  antithetical  treatment  of 
the  problem  of  purpose.  Darwinism  and  design  are 
looked  at  as  if  they  were  oil  and  water,  and  would  not 
mix.  Hence  Dewey  undervalues  any  attempts  at  recon- 
ciliation or  mediation.  He  mentions  Asa  Gray  as  favor- 
ing the  Darwinian  principle  and,  at  the  same  time,  at- 
tempting to  reconcile  it  with  design.  He  calls  Gray 's  view 
"  design  on  the  installment  plan  ":  if  we  conceive  the 
"  stream  of  variations  "  to  be  itself  independent,  we  may 
suppose  that  each  successive  variation  was  designed  from 
the  first  to  be  selected.  Now,  this  view  of  Gray's  was 
based  on  Darwin's  assertion  that  it  was  "  impossible  to 
conceive  this  immense  and  wonderful  universe,  including 
man  with  his  capacity  of  looking  far  backwards  and 
far  into  futurity,  as  the  result  of  blind  chance  or  neces- 
sity."   Yet  Dewey  in  tuni  claims  Danvin's  refusal  to  be 


306  PRAGMATISM 

offset  by  the  great  evolutionist's  conviction  that,  since 
variations  are  in  useless  as  well  as  in  useful  directions, 
and  since  the  latter  are  sifted  out  simply  by  the  stress 
of  the  conditions  for  the  struggle  for  existence,  the 
design  argument  as  applied  to  living  beings  is  unjusti- 
fiable, and  its  lack  of  support  there  deprives  it  of  scien- 
tific value. 

Dewey  concludes  that  the  impossibility  of  assigning 
the  world  to  chance  as  a  whole,  and  to  design  in  its  parts, 
indicates  the  insolubility  of  the  question.  For  this  in- 
solubility he  offers  two  reasons :  one  is  that  the  problem 
is  too  high  for  intelligence;  the  other  is  that  the  ques- 
tion, in  its  very  asking,  makes  assumptions  that  render 
the  question  meaningless.  Once  admit  that  the  sole 
verifiable  or  fruitful  object  of  knowledge  is  the  particu- 
lar set  of  changes  that  generate  the  object  of  study,  to- 
gether with  the  consequences  that  then  flow  from  it,  and 
no  intelligible  question  can  be  asked  about  what,  by  as- 
sumption, lies  outside. 

Here  is  a  maze  of  objections  which  needs  to  be  ex- 
plored. We  make  bold  to  suggest  that  the  problem  is 
not  fairly  stated.  Possibly  the  maze  does  not  end  in  a 
blind  alley.  There  may  be  a  way  out.  If  the  cause  of 
the  evolutionary  flux  lies  outside,  of  course  the  prob- 
lem is  insoluble,  or,  what  amounts  to  the  same  thing,  the 
problem  is  too  high  for  intelligence.  But  suppose  we 
go  back  to  the  classic  notion  so  excellently  restated  by  the 
writer.  By  assuming  a  spiritual  causal  force  and  mak- 
ing it  immanent,  we  may  have  a  suggestion  of  a  solution. 
The  prime  cause  in  this  case  might  be  an  internal  per- 
fecting principle,  a  force  that  here  and  now  is  coming  to 
fruition.  This  is  Aristotle's  entelechy,  enlarged  to  cos- 
mic dimensions.  As  rational  it  may,  after  all,  be  appre- 
hended by  an  enlightened  reason.    If  we  insist  on  the 


THE  CHICAGO  SCHOOL:  JOHN  DEWEY        307 

distinction  that  it  may  be  apprehended,  not  coinpre- 
hcnded,  we  escape,  on  the  one  hand.  al)solute  afrnosticism, 
and,  on  the  other,  an  absolute  all-knower.  Granted,  then, 
an  immanent  spiritual  principle,  working  itself  out  ilay 
by  day,  we  have  that  clew  which  Asa  Gray  used  so 
effectively.  It  is  not  design  "  on  the  installment  plan," 
as  if  some  designer  were  hard  put  in  his  payments. 
What  Gray  sought  was  that  internal,  immanent,  ra- 
tional principle  which  made  natural  selection  select, 
which  sifted  out  the  useless,  and  which,  in  the  long  run, 
has  brought  a  gradual  complexity,  and,  at  the  same  time, 
a  gradual  improvement. 

If  this  suggested  sketch  of  ours  may  be  called  ab- 
solutism, it  is  not  the  kind  that  Dewey  disparages ;  it  does 
not  pretend  to  know  it  all ;  it  does  not  assume  some  far-off 
divine  event  toward  which  the  whole  creation  moves. 
For  all  his  strictures  upon  "  inclusive  first  causes  "  and 
"  exhaustive  final  goals  "  we  believe  that  Dewey  is  not 
Avithout  sympathy  with  this  interpretation,  which  is  that 
of  the  "  mild-tempered  rationalist."  At  any  rate,  he 
concludes  that  the  influence  of  Darwinism  upon  philos- 
ophy was  to  force  upon  it  modesty  and  responsibility,  for 
it  has  shifted  its  interest  from  an  intelligence  that  shaped 
things  once  for  all,  to  the  particular  intelligences  which 
things  are  even  now  shaping ;  from  an  ultimate  goal  of 
good  to  the  direct  increments  of  justice  and  happiness 
that  intelligent  administration  of  existent  conditionsi. 
may  beget. 

This  is  the  creed  of  the  Chicago  school.  Beginning 
with  the  principle  of  Peirce  as  a  method  to  clear  up  our 
ideas,  to  settle  metaphysical  puzzjgs.  it  drvflftps  into  in- 
stmmentalism.  or  the  view  that  all  our  theories  are  men- 
tnl  jTindp'i  of  arlni^tion  t"^  realjtv.  This  insmimentalism, 
in  turn,  approaches  humanism,  yet  not  so  as  ti>  make  the 


308  PRAGMATISM 

"  "^inan  or  personal  an  ultimate,  but  only  a  tool  in  genetic 
uevelopment,  a  function  in  social  improvement.  This  is 
DeweyT^stimat6  6i  lllS  own  position  and,  at  the  same 

^  time,  a  forecast  of  what  his  successor  was  to  do.  The 
moment  the  complicity  of  the  personal  factor  in  our 
philosophic  valuation  is  recognized  fully,  frankly,  and 
generally,  he  concludes,  that  moment  a  new  era  in 
philosophy  will  begin. 

4.   The  Cambridge  School  :  William  James 

The  new  era  predicted  by  Dewey  was  inaugurated  by 
"William  James  of  Harvard.  Pragmatism,  he  tells  us  in 
his  Lowell  Lectures  of  1906,  has  rather  suddenly  pre- 
cipitated itself  out  of  the  air,  because  in  thehistory  of 
philosophy  we  are  beginning  to  recognize  the__clash  of 
humaja_  temperaments^ 

^hus  begins  the  third  phase  in  the  pragmatic  move- 
ment,— the  temperamental.  The  change  is  significant. 
It  is  a  change  Irom  the  logical  to  the  psychological,  a 
process  which  reduces  the  cognitionjof  trutiL_tQ_the  satis- 
facticgLfif  felt  needs,  to~tFe  emotlonaljthrill.  Now,  while 
/ey  has  warned  us  against  the  surrender  to  the  emo- 
tional, James  accepts  it  as  a  prime  criterion  whereby 
first^to  judge  past  philosophy,  "then  to  form~the  philos- 
ophy Qlthe_  future.  '       ■ ~ 

'  The  professional  philosopher,  he  observes,  has  hitherto 
urged  impersonal  reasons  for  his  conclusion.  Yet  all  the 
time  he  has  been  following  that  view  of  the  universe 
which  best  suits  his  temperament;  that  he  trusts,  that 
is  the  potentest  of  all  his  premises.  If  distinctive  tem- 
'peraments  have  been  recognized  in  other  branches  of 
activity,  why  not  in  philosophy?  In  government  there 
has  been  authoritarian  and  anarchist;  in  literature  pu- 


THE  CAMBRIDGE  SCHOOL:  WILLIAM  JAMES    309 

rists  and  realists;  in  art  classics  and  romantics.  So  in 
philosophy  we  have  a  very  similar  contrast  expressed  in 
the  pair  of  terms  "  rationalists  "  and  "  empiricists;  " — 
"  empiricist  "  meaning  your  lover  of  facts  in  all  their 
crude  variety,  "  rationalist  "  your  devotee  to  abstract 
and  eternal  principles.  In  fine,  the  two  types  of  mental 
make-up  may  have  their  characteristics  written  down  in 
two  columns.  On  the  one  side  is  the  rationalist,  who 
is  idealistic,  optimistic,  religious,  frec-willist,  monistic, 
dogmatical.  On  the  other  side  is  the  empiricist,  who 
is  materialistic,  pessimistic,  irreligious,  fatalistic,  plural- 
istic, skeptical. 

At  the  first  glance  the  drawing  up  of  this  table  of 
contrast  between  the  "  tough-minded  "  empiricist  and 
the  **  tender-minded  "  rationalist  seems  to  commit  the 
same  fault  as  that  with  which  the  absolutists  were 
charged.  It  postulates  theses,  assumes  their  antitheses 
or  logical  opposites,  and  concludes  that  nuin  must  belong 
either  to  one  set  or  the  other.  It  is  the  same  sort  of 
artificial  depiction  of  character  that  was  committed  by 
Macaulay  in  his  contrasted  portraits  of  Cavalier  and 
Roundhead.  But  the  deadly  parallel  column  is  one 
thing,  live  people  another.  In  fact,  James  confesses 
that  most  of  us  have  a  hankering  for  the  good  tilings 
on  both  sides  of  the  line.  Let  us,  therefore,  adopt  a 
sort  of  pluralistic  monism  (for  both  facts  and  prin- 
ciples are  good).  Let  us  combine  practical  pessimism 
with  metaphysical  optimism  (for  though  the  evil  of  the 
parts  is  undeniable,  the  whole  cannot  be  e\il).  Finally, 
let  our  scientific  spirit  be  devout,  othens'ise  we  will 
find  an  empirical  philosophy  wliich  is  not  religious 
enough,  and  a  religious  philosophy  that  is  not  em- 
pirical enough.  .  .  .  Thus  may  pratrniatism  be  a  media- 
tion botwppn   ton^Mi-miruTeftn'  ss  TmTT  tt  iiMrr-iininlriTness. 


310  PRAGMATISM 

thus   may   tenderfoot   Bostonians   mingle   with   Rocky- 
Mountain  toughs. 

This   is    the    Cambridge   solution    of    ' '  the    present 

I  dilemma  in  philosophy."    It  is  the  opposite  of  that  of 

I   the  Chicago  school.     It  is  not  a  logical   rejection  of 

I   alternatives,  but  a  psychological  adaptation  of  one  to  the 

/    other.     It  offers  a  true  humanism,  for  humanity  in  its 

I    ch^cesjises~its~T5ea^]as_w^  Now,  all  this 

[    seems  quite  UTogieal  unless  it  ^_gi:antedj;hat  there  is 

^a  logjc_of  the  emotion^  based_u£on  grounds  of  personal 

preference.    Such  grounds  James  brings  forward  in  his 

lecture  on  "  Some  Metaphysical  Problems  Pragmatically 

Considered."    In  this  he  assumes  his  role  as  a  mediator. 

This  was  made  possible  by  his  personality,  combining 

as  it  did  a  genial  hospitality  to  all  forms  of  thought 

^swith  a  marked  boldness  in  undertaking  difficult  tasks. 

VHis  pragmatism  becomes  to  philosophy,  then,  what  a 
court  of  arbitration  is  to  capital  and  labor, — an  organ 
of  mediation   between  arrogant  rationalism   and  com- 
placent common  sense.    The  new  system,  like  its  author, 
fe}  essentially  independent;  it  follows  neither  the  pro- 
fessional philosopher  on  his  high  a  priori  road,  nor  the 
man  in  the  street  with  his  cocksure  notions  of  truth. 
Rather  does  it  strive  to  tread  a  path  between  the  two, 
a  via  media  from  which  may~be~obtained  jhe_ideal  out- 
lookl)f  tlie  one  and  the^oncrete  practicality  of  the^other. 
(  In  this  role  of  mediation  prag^matism  exhibits  its  adapt- 
\  ability  to  modern  demands.    Finding  the  world  sick  of 
'  abstractions  and,  at  the  same  time,  uninspired  by  the 
/  current  beliefs,  it  offers  itself  as  a  tonic  for  tired  minds, 
(    a  pungent  compound  which  will  restore  the  jaded  appe- 
1   tite  for  the  speculative  life. 

Such   a  mediating  part  James  had  once  hoped  the 
Chicago  school  would  undertake.    That  school,  however, 


THE  CA^IBRIDGE  SCHOOL:  WILLIAM  JAMES     311 

left  the  impression  of  being  hostile  to  the  abstract,  the 
a  priori.  Coming  from  a  new  part  of  the  country  it  was 
typically  averse  to  the  old  culture.  It  is  not  so  with 
the  Eastern  philosopher,  who  offers  pragmatism  as  a 
means  of  satisfying  both  kinds  of  dt-inand,  remaining 
religious  like  the  rationalisms,  but,  like  the  empiricisms, 
preserving  the  richest  intimacy  with  facts.  This  is  again 
a  recourse  to  the  pragmatic  method  as  primarily  one 
of  settling  metaphysical  disputes  that  otherwise  might 
be  interminable.  Is  the  world  one  or  many? — fated  or 
free? — material  or  spiritual?  Disputes  over  such  no- 
tions are  unending,  unless  we  try  to  interpret  each  no- 
tion by  tracing  its  respective  consequences. 

Thus  does  James  ingeniously  escape  the  dilemma  of 
Dewey.  Instead  of  a  process  of  mutual  cancellation  be- 
tween different  alternatives,  he  holds  that  alternatives 
with  no  practical  consequences  are  not  really  differences. 
Thus  science  and  metaphysics  come  together,  for  thj£Drie*>- 

hpjflg  ingtrnnipntg^-tml  fln<;wprg  tn  pjiigwaft-  prftginatiou. 

unstiffen^  all  our^hcories,  limbers  them  up  and_sets 
each  one  at  work.  .  .  .  Here  is  temperamental  philosophy 
"of^ffiFMghest  kincr  James  calls  it  democratic,  but  we 
should  prefer  to  call  it  urbane.  It  does  not  accentuate 
local  differences,  but  accepts  cues  from  all  quarters. 
Such  pragmatism,  as  its  author  explains,  is  willing  to 
take  anj^liing,  to  follow  either  logic  or  the  senses  and  to 
count  as  proof  the  humblest  and  most  personal  experi- 
ences; she  is  completely  genial;  she  will  entertain  any 
hypothesis ;  she  will  consider  any  evidence. 

James  shows  in  this  the  enthusiastic  urbanity  of  a 
man  of  wide  and  varied  activities.  The  artist  in  him 
comes  out  in  the  contrasted  portraits  of  rationalist  and 
empiricist,  where  he  strives  to  give  an  impression  by 
constant  minute  touches,  and  thus  to  let  us  see  the  mas- 


312  PRAGMATISM 

terpiece  in  the  making.  The  physiologist  is  evident  in 
the  emphasis  on  the  bodily,  realistic  side  of  life,  where 
he  shows  his  preference  for  warm  vitality  and  thus  al- 
lows us  to  catch  the  essential  personal  flavor.  The 
psychologist  we  see  in  the  stress  on  the  emotions,  in  the 
emphasis  on  the  conative  side  of  life.  Here  James  asks 
us:  How  does  the  world  feel  to  you?  What  are  the 
thoughts  that  thrill  you?  Finally,  the  religionist  ap- 
pears in  the  use  of  the  Absolute  as  a  source  of  spiritual 
comfort.  As  the  author  of  the  Varieties  of  Religious 
Experience  James  draws  on  his  immense  stores  of  knowl- 
edge,— from  the  strange  cases  of  psychic-research,  to 
the  mysticism  of  William  Penn,  landed  proprietor,  and 
of  John  Bunyan,  tinker. 

An  enthusiastic  urbanity,  a  many-sided  personality 
furnish  the  equipment  of  James,  the  mediator  in  meta- 
physics. So  equipped  he  turns  to  some  metaphysical 
problems  which  are  to  be  pragmatically  considered. 
Here  pragmatism  means  not  the  bare  presentation  of  ab- 
stract outlines,  but  a  helpful  method  of  tracing  specific 
consequences  of  any  given  hypothesis.  Assuming  the 
empiricist  attitude,  it  turns  toward  concreteness  and 
adequacy,  toward  fact,  toward  action,  and  toward  power. 
How  is  one  to  choose,  say,  between  optimism  and  pessi- 
mism? By  its  effects  on  practical  living,  responds  the 
pragmatist;  one  naturally  accepts  the  former  doctrine 
because  it  gives  a  happier  view  of  the  world.  Or,  again, 
what  practical  difference  does  it  make  now  that  the  world 
should  be  thought  to  be  run  by  spirit  or  by  matter?  In 
the  one  case  there  would  be  the  hypothesis  of  an  eternal 
perfect  edition  of  the  universe  coexisting  with  our  finite 
experience,  in  the  other  the  hypothesis  of  blind  physical 
forces,  bits  of  brute  matter  unconsciously  following  their 
particular  laws.    Between  theism  and  materialism,  thus 


THE  CAMBRIDGE  SCHOOL:  WH.LIAM  JAMES     313 

presented,  it  is  impossible  to  choose  hypothotically,  Init 
apply  the  principle  of  practical  results  and  there  is  vital 
difference.  The  one  hypothesis  is  pessimistic,  its  sun 
sets  in  a  sea  of  disappointment ;  the  other  is  melioristic 
and  means  the  preservation  of  our  ultimate  hopes,  since 
it  is  not  blind  force,  but  a  seemg  force,  which  runs  this 
universe.  So  likewise  with  the  controversy  between 
detenninism  and  free-will ;  pragmatism  rids  one  of  Puri- 
tanism, drives  away  the  vapors  of  a  bilious  conscience, 
and  puts  man,  if  not  on  the  road  to  perfectibility,  at 
least  into  the  fresh  fields  of  independent  action. 

Thus  briefly  does  James  settle  metaphysical  problems 
by  the  pragmatic  method.     Using  the  test  of  tempera- 
mental likings  he  has  been  accused  of  confusing  the  tnie 
with  the  pleasant  and  of  making  the  ground  of  prefer- 
ence merely  personal.    The  first  charge  is  that  of  hedon- 
ism, the  second  that  of  solipsism.     Neither  charge  is 
wholly  warranted.     Pragmatism  takes  account  of  evil     /k/v/l/''^'*^ 
and  will  accept  a  God  who  "  lives  in  the  very  dirt  of  .^ 
private  fact."    Again  pragmatism  is  not  a  narrow  indi — '\^       lI 
vidualism.    It_holds_tMt_tnith_is  made  by^sQciciXj^i^Dd.     jj'^'^^^ 
i^   onlya   collective  name   for  verification.     Being   a 
social  product  it  may,  therefore,  be  called  a  species  of 
higher  hedonism.     Thereby  is  it  relieved  of  the  accusa- 
tion of  keeping  its  eyes  bent  on  the  immediate  practical 
foreground,  for  it  dwells  just  as  much  upon  the  world's 
remotest  perspectives.    In  this  defense  James,  the  medi- 
ator and  smoother-over  of  transitions,  gains  a  certain^ 

likeness  to  the  absolutist,  for  he  adds  that  the  absolute  1 
things,  the  last  things,  the  overlapping  things,  are  the  / 
truly  philosophic  concerns.  Biit_we__should_intt'rpret  f 
this  as  dnr  not  nn  rrmrli  hi  llir~rTtTTTThT44^tif  as  to  the  I 
aesthetic  motive,  the  artisL's  interest  in -Vji-nii.hinprpoint.s  I 
and  disappearing  lines.    And  along  with  it  wc  must  put     A 


314  PRAGMATISM 

the  pragmatic  check.  James  speaks  of  the  vast  drifting 
of  the  cosmic  weather,  yet  he  does  not  imply  that  there 
is  such  a  thing  as  a  meteorology  of  metaphysics.  lie 
argues  that  we  cannot  by  any  possibility  comprehend  the 
character  of  a  cosmic  mind  whose  purposes  are  fully 
revealed  by  the  strange  mixture  of  goods  and  evils  that 
we  find  in  this  world's  particulars.  Apparently  an  aas- 
thetic  union  obtains  among  things;  they  tell  a  story; 
their  parts  hang  together  so  as  to  work  out  a  climax. 
But  absolute  gesthetic  union  is  another  barely  abstract 
idea;  until  we  can  affirm  one  sovereign  purpose,  sys- 
tem, story,  the  world  appears  as  something  more  epic 
than  dramatic. 

The  Cambridge  pragmatist  now  reaches  another  of  his 
mediations.  It  is  in  epistemology,  the  problem  of  knowl- 
edge, and  concerns  the  choice  between  absolutism  and 
agnosticism.  When  he  affirms  that  in  this  world  there 
are  as  many  disjunctions  as  conjunctions,  and  hence  there 
can  be  no  one  knower,  no  all-enveloping,  noetic  unity, 
we  are  forced  into  that  modern  form  of  skepticism  re- 
garding a  universal  substance.  If  there  be  such  a  cosmic 
connective  tissue,  the  human  observer  has  not  yet  learned 
to  stain  it — such  seems  to  be  his  conclusion.  In  the  same 
way  we  may  interpret  the  allied  problem  of  cosmology, 
the  ancient  puzzle  of  "  the  one  and  the  many." 
Accepting  design,  free-will,  the  absolute  mind,  spirit  in- 
stead of  matter,  because  they  have  for  their  sole  mean- 
ing a  better  promise  as  to  this  world 's  outcome,  pragmat- 
ism suddenly  abandons  this  monistic  point  of  view  and 
takes  up  with  a  pluralistic.  This  at  first  appears  un- 
natural ;  it  is  as  if  an  American  of  the  strict  construc- 
tionist type  should  suddenly  give  up  the  idea  of  the 
paramountcy  of  the  federal  government  and  become  a 
violent  advocate  of  States'  rights.     And  yet  this  ap- 


THE  CAMBRIDGE  SCHOOL:  WILLIAM  JAMES     315 

parent  reversal  of  judginent  has  its  reasons;  namely,  the 
tcmperaniental  preferences  of  the  autlior  for  that  rieli 
medley  of  facts  called  the  world,  rather  than  for  that 
rislcy  dogma  of  an  absolutely  perfect  universe.  Here 
the  monist  might  be  compared  to  the  protectionist,  who 
argues  that  if  one  break  be  allowed  in  the  sacrosanct 
tariff  sj'stem  the  whole  will  fall  to  the  ground.  To  this 
philosophic  stand-patter  comes  pragmatism  unstifTening 
his  theories,  showing  that  this  is  no  more  the  best  of  all 
possible  worlds  than  that  the  present  is  the  best  of  all 
possible  administrations,  and  that  pluralism,  like  States' 
rights,  is  necessary  to  the  free  play  of  parts  so  conducive 
to  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness.  Pragmat- 
ism, then,  it  is  said,  pending  the  final  empirical  ascer- 
tainment of  just  what  the  balance  of  union  and  dis- 
union among  things  may  be,  must  obviously  range  itself 
upon  the  pluralistic  side  and  sincerely  entertain  the 
hypothesis  of  a  world  imperfectly  unified  still.  Hence*^ 
the  actual  world,  instead  of  being  complete  "  eternally,"  / 
as  the  monists  assure  us,  may  be  eternally  incomplete// 
and  at  all  times  subject  to  addition  or  liable  to  loss.  / 
The  adoption  of  the  temperamental  test  has  led  to 
pluralism.  Its  later  application  to  religion  is  made  in  a 
startling  form  of  polytheism.  Meanwhile  James  takes 
up  the  discussion  of  tnith,  first  in  its  relations  to  com- 
mon sense,  and  then  in  its  higher  scientific  and  social 
aspects.  The  former  discussion  is  one  of  the  least  satis- 
factory in  the  book.  It  defends  noetic  pluralism  on  the 
ground  that  we  can  know  the  parts  and  some  of  their 
combinations,  but  not  the  whole.  It  defends  this  view 
by  a  figure  of  speech,  holding  that  the  universe  is  not 
a  final  dc  luxe  edition,  but  a  volume  in  the  makia2»r:rit 
might  well  have  been  said  a  loose-leaf  ledger.  It  finally 
gives,  as  a  basis  of  common   sense.   Herbert   Spencer's 


316 


PRAGMATISM 


*'  .L>*veri 


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/. 


J^ 


^ 


/■ 


V-     I 


« 


shallow  hypothesis  that  our  fundamental  ways  of  think- 
ing about  things  are  discoveries  of  exceedingly  remote 
ancestors,  which  have  been  able  to  preserve  themselves 
throughout  the  experience  of  all  subsequent  time.  These 
are  the  funded  truths  squeezed  from  the  past,  which  ap- 
pear natural  to  us  because  they  were  once  so  fruitful. 

We  may  grant  that  such  common-sense  principles  are 
survivals  of  the  fittest,  but  that  does  not  answer  the  qucs- 
/tion  why  they  are  fit.  This  problem  of  the  agreement  of 
tnith  and  reality,  whether  there  exist  principles  of 
erity  in  the  very  constitution  of  the  cosmos,  is  left 
to  the  most  crucial  and  the  most  difficult  chapter  of  this 
work.  In  regard  to  the  '  *  Notion  of  Truth  ' '  pragmatists 
and  intellectualists  are  both  said  to  accept  the  dictionary 
definition  of  truth  as  agreement  of  ideas  with  reality. 
They  begin  to  quarrel  only  after  the  question  is  raised  as 
to  what  may  precisely  be  meant  by  the  term  "  agree- 
ment," and  what  by  the  term  "  reality,"  when  reality 
is  taken  as  something  for  our  ideas  to  agree  with.  On 
the  one  hand,  the  idealists  seem  to  say  that  ourideas  are 


true  wheneverTEey  are  what  God  means  that  we  ought 
to  think  about  that  object;  whenever  they  approach  to 
being  copies  of  the  Absolute's  eternal  way  of  thinking. 
This  is  the  great  assumption  of  the  intellectualists  that 
truth  means  essentkJly^j,n_inert^static^  Prag- 

other 


matism,  on  The  other  hand,  asks  its  usual  question. 
r*"  Grant  an  idea  or  belief  to  be  true,  what  concrete  dif- 
I  ference  will  its  being  true  make  in  anyone's  aT;tual  be- 
11  li^T?  How  willthe^ruth  be  realized?  What  experi- 
jf  en'ces  will  be  diHerentfronTtlTose' which  would  obtain  if 
/  the  belief  were  false?  What,  in  short,  is  the  truth's 
^^^ash-value  in  the  experientiarferms?  " 

At  this  hypothetical  question  the  defense  is  up  in 
arms.    Practical  differences !    Cash-values !    Such  phrases 


THE  CAMBRIDGE  SCHOOL:  WILLIAM  JAMES     317 

pervert  the  principle  of  Pciree  into  a  transaetion  of  tju' 
Chicago  clearing-house.  Here  one  critic,  adopting  a  sort 
of  slang  which  pragmatism  does  not  disdain  to  use,  has 
defined  truth  as  "  x\ny  old  thing  that  works!  " 

That  pragmatism  as  a  gospel  of  success  is  utilitarian 
James  frankly  grants.    The  true,  he  continues,  is  only 
the  expedient  in  the  way  of  our  thinking,  just  as  the       <. 
right  is  only  the  expedient  in  the  way  of  our  behaving.  ^      . 

The  first  meaning  of  truth  is,  therefore,  that  of  a  method. |    fv^*^ 
Primarily  it^  mean's^  Teadtng  that  is  worth  while.    Tiie 
discovery  of  a  working  hypothesis  is  usedby  the  prag-         r*-^ 
matist  in  just  the  way  a  path  is  followed  by  a  wanderer,       ''^ 
because  it  looks  as  if  it  might  lead  out  of  the  woo<ls.  j^^ 

Besides  being  a  method  of  utility,  pragmatic  truth  is  a  7    ^^ 
theory  of  reality.  Toii  can  say  of  it,  then,  either  that ' '  it 


r 


.W"> 


is  useful  because  it  is  true,"  or  that  "  it  is  true  because 

it  is  useful." 

In  this  statement  we  charge  the  author  \aW\  making  a 

,__ — ■ — ,  ,        ^  '^    U 

false  conversion  of  a  proposition,  in  othor_ words  of  ini-      ^  ,^jiM 

plying  That  it  is  a  poor  rulc^that  does  not  work  i)oth 
wa};^;_Jlt  is  easy  to  concede  the  last  half  of  the  proposi- 
tion, for  that  is  only  saying  that  true  thoughts  are 
invaluable  instruments  of  action.  But  in  changing  tho. 
proposition  "it  is  true  because  it  works  "  into  "  it 
works  because  it  is  true  "  we  change  from  an  object,  a 
successful  result,  to  a  notion  of  some  standard  upon 
which  the  workability,  the  success,  depends.  Now^  tliis, 
notion  of  a  standard  would  imply  some  fixed  reality  like 
PlatUTiiu  arcll(5iypes,  which  exist  eternally  and  outside 
human  minds.  IBut  thi^  ir  nriV-infT  tnit)i  static  and  de-"^ 
humanizing  it.  thcrcfo£e_£Uch^  a  vijiW-is  condemned,  bo-  / 
cause  pragmatism  is  dynamic  and  humanistii'.  Trutli-is,/ 
not  a  fixed  standard  but  a  flying  goal,  and  the  world  we 
know  is  detennincd  by  the  human  faculties. 


318  PRAGMATISM 

Platonism  and  pragmatism  are  thus  at  opposite  poles. 
The  former  says  our  ideas  are  true  if  they  are  ectypes  of 
archetypes,  shadows  or  copies  of  the  absolute  and  eter- 
nal forms  of  thought.  Pragmatism  says,  truths  are  not 
copies  but  consistencies ;  truths  emerge  from  facts ;  they 
are  not  once  and  forever  true  but  always  in  the  making, 
humanity  being  the  constant  creator  of  working  hypothe- 
ses, of  tentative  theories.  By  these  it  adapts  itself  to 
changing  circumstances  as  does  a  marching  army  to  the 
rise  and  fall  of  the  road.  This  sharp  contrast  be- 
tween the  static  and  the  absolute,  between  the  dynamic 
and  relative,  is  easy  to  draw  because  of  the  current  re- 
vival of  the  ancient  Greek  conception  of  cosmic  fluxility, 
of  a  plastic  principle  in  nature.  Conventional  monism, 
with  its  insistence  on  eternal  principles  and  fixed  arche- 
types, will  be  hard  pressed  to  explain  away  that  mutabil- 
ity in  nature,  that  changing  pageantry  in  earth  and  sky, 
from  which  writers  like  Emerson  and  Whitman  drew 
their  philosophies.  This  being  the  day  of  the  "  rushing 
metamorphosis,"  the  notion  of  a  finished  world  is  as  hard 
to  grasp  as  the  notion  of  a  finished  waterfall;  or,  to 
carry  out  the  figure,  instead  of  being  immutable,  a 
frozen  river  of  reality,  truth  is  ever  in  mutation,  ever 
carried  forward  on  tlie  flowing  stream  of  consciousness. 

This  conclusion  strikes  many  as  nihilistic.  According 
to  James  the  pragmatic  theory  of  reality  holds  that  be- 
hind the  bare  phenomenal  facts  there  is — nothing.  Is 
not  this  an  exaggeration?  Though  the  flowing  stream 
of  consciousness  has  no  bottom,  it  has  banks  and  these 
we  take  to  be  the  human  factors,  the  guiding  principles 
furnished  by  men's  minds.  For,  as  James  concedes, 
instead  of  reality  as  such,  ready-made  from  all  eternity, 
we  have  a  man-made  reality.  "  It  is  we  who  create  true 
principles,  in  i(5  reality  is  in  the  making  and  owr  descrip- 


THE  CAMBRIDGE  SCHOOL:  WILLIAM  JAMES     319 


tions  are  metaphysical  additions  to  facts,"  Again  in- 
stead of  the  abstract  worship  of  timeless  reality,  a  pre- 
tense that  the  eternal  is  unrolling,  we  prefer  a  loose 
universe,  truth  growing  up  inside  of  all  the  finite  experi- 
ences, "  we  men  adding  our  fiats  to  the  fiat  of  the 
Creator." 

This  is  the  Cambridge  theor>'  of  reality.  It  is  a 
bold  doctrine.  It  is  not  merely  humanism,  but  the  wor- 
ship of  humanity.  James  recognizes  this,  and  in  his 
last  chapter,  "  Pragmatism  and  Religion,"  reaches  his 
final  view  of  truth.  Truth  is  not  only  a  method  to  gain 
successful  results,  or  a  theory  of  reality  as  fluxility,  but  a 
temper  of  mind,  an  emotional  belief  which  gives  pcnional 
satisfaction.  This  satisfaction  may  be  so  intense  as 
to  be  justly  called  a  religion,  not  in  the  monistic,  mystical 
way  of  pure  cosmic  emotion,  but  in  the  humanistic 
way, — a  universe  with  such  as  us  contributing  to  create 
its  truth,  a  world  delivered  to  our  opportunities  and 
our  private  judgments,  where  God  is  viewed  as  but  one 
helper,  in  the  midst  of  all  the  shapers  of  the  world's 
fate. 

At  this  turn  in  the  road,  we  have  come  back  to  that 
temperamental  test  with  which  the  book  began,  namelv: 
The   whfje   fiimr-tiQn    of  philosophyought   to  be   to  filuTj 

it  what  d efinite  difference  it 'wiTrma ke  to  you  and  me, 
at  deHnite  instants ~of~ou,r  life,  if  this  wofld-fomuila 
or  that  world-formula  be  the  Irne-ofleT  The  formula 
which  James  reaches  is  thatof_fMing^_ofJnstinet,  of-^ 
intuition,  for  in  tIiC~Tn4-lIe'^oncludes :  "  It  is  our  faith 
and  not  our  logic  that  decides  such  questions, — the 
human  imagination  which  lives  in  a  moralistic  and  epic 
kind  of  universe,  and  avoids  the  two  extremes  of  crude 
naturalism  on  the  one  hand,  and  transcendental  abso 
lutism  on  the  other." 


320  PRAGMATISM 

Here  ends  the  pragmatism  of  James, — carried  fur- 
ther, but  not  essentially  changed,  in  his  subsequent 
works,  A  Pluralistic  Universe  and  The  Meaning  of  Truth. 
But  without  recourse  to  these  other  volumes  of  delight 
let  us  summarize  the  system  as  James  has  left  it ;  go  back 
to  its  sources  or  affiliations,  and,  finally,  attempt  to  give 
its  probable  place  in  the  history  of  American  thought. 

5.   The  Sources  of  Pragmatism 

To  call  the  Cambridge  pragmatism  a  system  is  ap- 
parently a  misnomer.  At  the  outset,  protests  James,  it 
stands  for  no  particular  results ;  it  has  no  doctrine  save 
its  methods.  As  the  young  Italian  pragmatist,  Papini, 
has  well  said,  it  lies  in  the  midst  of  our  theories,  like  a 
corridor  in  a  hotel.  Let  us  grant  that  pragmatism  is  this 
corridor,  and  not  a  metaphysical  roof  to  cover  all;  it 
still  furnishes  a  scheme,  if  not  a  system.  In  the  case  of 
James  this  scheme  is  determined  by  temperamental  tests, 
by  personal  preferences.  As  a  mediator,  a  man  of  pacific 
disposition,  he  is  primarily  opposed  to  dogmas.  Against 
the  must  be  of  the  intellectualist  he  puts  the  may  be 
of  the  empiricist.  Thus  the  philosophical  trinity  of  the 
absolute  idealist  would  be  interpreted  as  follows :  God, — 
a  good  working  hypothesis;  immortality, — a  vague  con- 
fidence in  the  future;  freedom, — a  melioristic  doctrine 
whereby  improvement  at  least  is  possible.  To  abso- 
lutists this  may  seem  like  giving  up  strong  meat  for 
modified  milk,  but  the  Cambridge  scheme  is  not  entirely 
negative,  does  not  wholly  agree  with  another  dictum  of 
Papini 's  that  "  pragmatism  is  really  less  a  philosophy 
than  a  method  of  doing  without  one."  The  American 
species  is  not  invertebrate,  it  has  an  historic  backbone. 
James  says  that  it  agrees  with  nominalism  in  appealing 


THE  SOURCES  OF  PRAGMATISM  321 

to  particulars;  ^Yith  utilitarianism  in  oniphasiziug  prac- 
tical aspects;  with  positivism  in  its  disdain  for  meta- 
physical abstractions.  In  these  confessed  resemblances 
the  author  is  but  carrying  out  the  full  title  of  his  book — 
Pragmatism,  a  New  Name  for  Same  Old  ^Yays  of 
Thinking. 

We  may  go  further.  Recalling  the  title  of  a  quaint 
deistic  work — Christianity  as  Old  as  the  Creation — we 
may  speak  of  "  Pragmatism  as  Old  as  Speculation." 
From  the  Greeks  to  modern  days  the  pragmatic  stream 
has  flowed  unbroken.  Dewey  may  disparage  the  past, 
but  the  continuity  of  kindred  thought  is  a  fact.  We  take 
the  long  leap  backward  and  begin  with  TIeracleitus.  His 
doctrine  we  have  already  noticed.  That  all  tlows,  that 
reality  is  fluxility,  that  there  is  no  finality  in  truth — is 
the  very  soul  of  the  latter-day  flowing  philosophy.  Next, 
the  sophistic  doctrine,  that  man  is  the  measure  of  all 
things,  is  revived  in  the  modern  individualism,  where 
there  are  many  men  of  many  minds,  and  as  many  kinds 
of  reality  as  there  are  pragmatists.  Schiller  of  Oxford 
has  defended  this  ancient  sophistic  doctrine  as  explain- 
ing the  bewildering  variety  of  human  customs  and  be- 
liefs, and  enabling  men  to  conceive  objective  "  truth," 
not  as  an  initial  gift  of  the  gods,  but  as  a  practical  and 
social  problem.  The  choice  then  favors  Protagoras 
rather  than  Plato,  for  the  latter 's  ideal  theory  explained 
nothing,  just  becau.se,  by  being  elevated  above  the  flux,  it 
had  lost  all  touch  with  humanity. 

So  much  for  the  agreement  with  Hellenic  tiiought. 
For  the  medieval,  James  has  this  single  word — that  prag- 
matism agrees  with  nominalism  in  its  app(>al  to  particu- 
lars. This  means  that  a  name  is  nothing  but  a  summation 
of  experiences,  a  short  cut  to  reality,  not  a  reality  it.self. 
This  is  diametrically  opposed  to  that  form  of  Platouism 


322  PRAGMATISM 

revived  in  scholastic  realism  which  held  that  back  of 
every  name  there  is  a  reality,  a  supersensible  essence  ex- 
isting independent  of  particulars. 

As  pragmatism  agrees  with  empiricism  and  is  opposed 
to  transcendentalism  ancient  and  medieval,  so  does  it 
stand  in  relation  to  modern  empiricism  and  transcenden- 
talism. In  these  connections  we  may  take  the  Western  na- 
tions briefly  one  by  one.  Among  the  English  we  find  Lord 
Bacon, — the  father  of  empiricism, — with  his  saying  that 
knowledge  is  power ;  John  Locke  with  his  habit  of  testing 
abstract  ideas,  like  substance,  in  terms  of  experience; 
David  Hume  with  his  attack  on  intellectualism  and  his 
advice  to  throw  metaphysics  to  the  flames.  As  to  Hume 
the  resemblance  between  the  arch-skeptic  and  the  modem 
sophist  is  strong.  Just  as  James  uses  theories  as  short- 
cuts to  reality  and  advises  us  to  act  as  if  this  and  that 
were  true,  so  Hume  uses  belief  to  bridge  over  difficulties 
and  asks  us  to  invent  such  a  notion  as  causality  as  a  sort 
of  fictitious  glue  to  bind  the  cosmos  together. 

These  are  the  earlier  English  empiricists.  Among  the 
later  stand  forth  Darwin  and  Mill.  The  parallels  with 
the  former  are  obvious :  the  familiar  phrases — adaptation 
to  environment,  struggle  for  existence,  survival  of  the 
fittest — are  the  very  watchwords  of  the  modern  practical- 
ism.  And  so  is  it  with  John  Stuart  Mill,  to  whom  James 
dedicates  his  volume  as  the  one  ''  From  whom  I  first 
learned  the  pragmatic  openness  of  mind  and  whom  my 
fancy  likes  to  picture  as  our  leader  were  he  alive  to- 
day." 

So  much  for  the  British  empiricists.  The  affinities  are 
so  strong  that  pragmatism  might  almost  be  called  Anglo- 
Americanism,  As  for  the  Germans  there  are  few  affinities 
acknowledged  by  the  pragmatists  themselves.  With  a 
practical  working  treaty  between  the  two  English-speak- 


THE  SOURCES  OF  PRAGMATISM  323 

ing  countries  it  niiglit  be  expected  that  the  Germans 
should  be  left  out.  It  is  worse  than  that.  Against  the 
whole  tribe  of  Teutonic  idealists  there  is  a  chorus  of 
objections,  strictures,  taunts,  and  vilifications.  Thus 
Dewey  holds  that  Kant  never  emerges  from  his  fallacies, 
and  James  holds  up  to  derision  the  "  hollow  god  "  of 
Hegel.  But  in  spite  of  James's  protestations  that  he  has 
never  received  a  single  clear  idea  from  Kant,  there  are 
marked  resemblances  between  the  philosopher  of  Koenigs- 
berg  and  that  of  Cambridge.  Kant's  doctrine  of  postu- 
lates has  a  family  likeness  to  James's  Will  to  Believe. 
"  I  will  that  there  be  a  God,  in  order  to  the  living  of 
my  moral  life  "  sounds  much  like  James's  exhortations  to 
act  as  if  there  were  a  seeing  force  that  runs  things. 
Further  resemblances  have  been  brought  out  by  Arthur 
McGiffert.  In  addition  to  this  faith  in  God  as  an  heroic 
deed,  not  a  passive  acquiescence,  there  is  the  doctrine  of 
meliorism — "  that  the  world  as  a  whole  is  always  im- 
proving." And  besides  the  primacy  of  the  will,  the 
recognition  of  its  activity  in  forming  the  truth,  there  is 
the  doctrine  of  humanism, — that  man  is  a  factor  in  the 
making  of  reality,  that  there  is  a  pla.stic  world  to  whicii 
he  gives  meaning  and  value. 

All  this  sounds,  and  is  very  pragmatic.  The  unprag- 
matic  part  arises  in  the  monism  of  Post-Kantian  idealism, 
that  transcendcntalizing  of  his  teachings  against  which 
the  master  warned  his  disciples.  In  this  regard  Hegel 
was  the  chief  offender,  for  he  did  turn  theolog}-  into 
theosophy,  the  postulate  of  deity  as  an  "  idea  made  by 
ourselves  with  a  practical  purpose  "  into  an  assumption 
that  by  mere  thinking  man  can  find  out  God.  Against 
such  a  perversion  the  pragmatists  have  grounds  for  pro- 
test. They  especially  dread  that  Franken.stein  deity, — 
an  absolute  being  derived  by  the  dialectical  process  of  the 


324  PRAGMATISM 

unfolding  of  the  Idea.  We  do  not  pretend  to  solve  the 
secret  of  Hegel,  but  we  can  understand  how  such  formula 
would  drive  James  mad.  This  rigid  doctrine  of  "  becom- 
ing "  according  to  preconceived  plans  would  irritate  an 
independent  American  much  as  might  the  rules  and 
regulations  of  a  bureaucratic  police. 

There  remains  a  third  German  idealist  to  be  reckoned 
wdth,  Schopenhauer's  World  as  Will  might  appear  akin 
to  the  Chicago  civic  motto  * '  I  Will  ' '  and  all  the  implica- 
tions of  the  strenuous  life.  In  a  measure  the  tran- 
scendental energism  does  seem  like  the  transatlantic  rest- 
lessness. But  with  the  apparent  likeness  there  is  a 
fundamental  difference.  The  German's  will  is  a  cosmic 
principle,  a  hidden  fatal  force  which  carries  mankind 
irresistibly  onward.  The  American's  will  is  individual, 
each  man  is  the  architect  of  his  own  fortune.  Now,  while 
the  false  identification  of  the  two  schools  of  energism  can- 
not be  attributed  to  Dewey,  it  might  be  to  James.  Some 
take  his  appeal  to  the  subliminal  to  be  an  appeal  to  the 
transcendental.  This  is  a  misinterpretation.  The  energies 
of  men  which  he  bids  us  use  are  not  beyond  experience, 
but  only  beneath  the  threshold  of  consciousness.  Fur- 
thermore, there  is  a  confusion  of  temperaments.  To  put 
James  among  the  pessimists  is  an  absurdity  to  one  fa- 
miliar with  his  personality.  The  will  to  believe,  as  his 
compatriots  take  it,  is  a  will  to  believe  in  the  better, 
and  upon  this  temperamental  quality  is  based  the  doe- 
trine  of  meliorism.  The  Cambridge  thinker  would  be 
the  last  to  say  that  there  is  a  final  futility  in  the  will, 
and  an  ultimate  necessity  for  self-denial  and  self-anni- 
hilation. 

It  is  easy  to  see  that  the  resemblances  between  the 
Teutonic  and  transatlantic  philosophers  are  less  than  the 
differences.     The  same  cannot  be  said  of  the  French. 


THE  SOURCES  OF  TRAGMATISM  32.'> 

Pragmatism  has  been  charged  with  lieing  a  rovaiupi'd 
positivism.  The  resemblances  are  striking.  Both  make 
much  of  science,  and  in  place  of  absolute  causes  put  rela- 
tive laws.  Both  emphasize  nature  and  prefer  the  ()l)ser- 
vatiou  of  phenomena  to  metaphysical  abstractions.  Both 
are  enamored  of  humanity  and  consider  man's  needs 
the  ultimate  aim  of  knowledge.  In  short,  both  are  scien- 
tific, naturalistic,  humanistic,  and  also — somewhat  skep- 
tical. They  do  not  care  for  supersensible  realities,  like 
first  grounds  and  ultimate  principles,  but  are  satisfied 
with  the  horizon  of  level  experience.  They  do  not  seek 
for  intellectual  unification  of  all  sciences,  but  are  con- 
tent to  employ  the  same  metiiod  in  all  cases. 

Is  pragmatism,  then,  a  revival  of  positivism,  the 
Cambridge  scholar  a  reincarnation  of  the  Parisian? 
James  objected  to  this  implication.  Through  his  early 
education  in  France  he  had  come  into  intimate  relations 
Avith  the  positive  point  of  view,  but  his  return  to  America 
l)rought  him  under  different  influences.  A  French  critic, 
Abel  Key,  has  exposed  the  difference  between  positivists 
and  pragmatists.  The  former,  he  explains,  are  guilty  of 
tlic  dogmatism  of  the  idea;  pure  thought,  the  correct 
formula  is  deemed  entirely  sufficient.  The  latter  are 
guilty  of  the  dogmatism  of  the  act ;  cognition  follows  the 
necessities  of  action.  There  is  no  scientific  truth,  but 
only  truths,  valuable  not  in  themselves,  but  only  as 
instruments. 

We  may  make  the  line  of  cleavage  even  sharper.  WHtTi  j  ,  c 
Comtc  there  is  a  worship  of  reason,  and  the  immutability 
of  natural  law  is  fundamental.  With  James  the  formula 
of  feeling  supplements  logic,  and  the  neglected  emotions 
are  given  their  proper  functions  of  motive  forces 
James's  pragmatism,  then,  has  two  focal  points  different 
from  positivism:  it  is  opposed  to  immutability;  it  is  i 


32G  PRAGMATISM 

favor  of  emotionality.  While  the  latter  of  these  points 
is  to  be  sought  in  James's  native  environment,  yet  the 
former  is  still  French.  When  James  spoke  of  all  our 
scientific  laws  being  only  approximations,  our  theories 
only  conceptual  shorthand  reports  of  nature,  he  was  re- 
flecting the  views  of  Poincare.  The  method  of  science, 
says  that  mathematician,  is  that  a  theory  is  only  a  trial 
and  error  scheme;  there  are  thousands  of  theories,  but 
only  a  few  of  them  fit  the  facts.  The  meaning  of  hy- 
pothesis is  then  only  a  working  hypothesis,  a  tool  which 
serves  to-day,  but  to-morrow  will  be  throwTi  on  the 
scrap-heap.  Such  a  view  is  congruous  to  both  the  schools 
of  Chicago  and  of  Cambridge.  It  is  evolutionary.  It  is 
another  instance  of  the  prodigality  of  nature.  The 
theories  thrown  out  by  the  human  mind  are  like  the 
wasted  spawn  of  which  only  a  fraction  comes  to  maturity. 
This  view  also  fits  the  latter-day  flowing  philosophy.  It 
tends  to  fluidity  of  thought  rather  than  to  finality  of 
truth.    There  is  nothing  absolutely  true;  not  even  this 

r statement. 
All  this  upholds  the  contention  of  James  that  prag- 
matism is  not  a  revival  of  the  outworn  positivism  of 
Comte,  Kenan,  and  Taine.  Positivism  is  unpragmatic 
in  its  insistency  on  the  supremacy  of  reason,  and  its 
founder  maintained  that  the  human  spirit  should  pro- 
ceed to  theoretical  researches,  completely  abstracting  it- 
self from  every  practical  consideration.  On  the  other 
hand,  pragmatism  is  non-positive  in  that  second  point  we 
noticed, — emotionality.  But  positivism  is  opposed  to 
feeling,  especially  religious  feeling.  No  Comtean  would 
put  on  the  same  level  the  experiences  of  science,  of  meta- 
hysics,  and  of  religion.  But  this  is  what  the  pragmatists 
do;  they  reverse  the  positive  formula  of  development — 
the  necessary  successive  phases ;  theological ;  metaphysi- 


THE  SOURCES  OF  PRAGMATISM M  327 

cal ;  positive — when  they  assert  tliat  pragmatism  can 
utilize  all  experiences,  from  the  clearest  to  the  most 
obscure,  from  the  clarities  of  science  to  the  mysteries  of 
the  subconscious. 

We  have  gone  through  the  forerunners  of  pragmatism, 
ancient,  medieval,  and  modern,  and  have  discovered  that 
the  pragmatists,  although  contemners  of  tlie  past,  have 
had  numerous  predecessors.  With  the  sophistic  doc- 
trine the  afl&nities  are  more  than  superficial,  with  the 
nominalistic  more  than  nominal.  But  with  the  modern 
the  perspective  is  closer  and  distinctions  loom  into  dilYej:-^ 
ences.  Although  pragmatism  is  so  largely  Anglo-Amer-  | 
ican,  the  American  movement  is  not  entirely  a  revival 
of  British  empiricism.  To  Bacon's  knowledge  is  power, 
James  adds,  knowledge  is  also  satisfaction.  To  Locke's 
two  inlets  of  knowledge,  sensation  and  reflt^etion.  lie  adds 
volition.  Against  Hume's  conception  of  religion  as  an 
outworn  superstition,  an  invention  of  priests,  he  puts 
religious  experience  as  an  outcome  of  the  passional  needs 
of  humanity.  James  is  the  brother  of  the  British  em^ 
piricists;  he  is  likewise  their  older  brother, — older  in 
time  and  with  a  wider  outlook.  As  Dickinson  Miller  has 
pointed  out,  they  asked — whence  it  came;  he  asks — 
whither  it  goes ;  they  asked — what  were  the  originals  of 
the  conception;  he  asks— what  is  to  be  the  effect  upon 
future  practical  experience. 

Pragmatism  is  not  merely  an  Anglo-Saxon  plant,  nor 
does  it  grow  solely  from  Continental  roots.  The  alleged 
affinities  disappear  on  closer  .scrutiny.  The  pragmatic 
principle  cannot  be  identified  with  Kant's  practical  pos- 
tulate in  either  of  its  two  senses.  It  is  not  constitutive, 
like  a  constitution  which  determines  the  very  growth  of 
the  body  politic.  It  is  not  regulative,  like  the  governor 
of   an    engine   which   controls   the   safety-valve.     It    is 


328  PRAGMATISM 

merely  heuristic, — a  means  of  finding  one's  way  out  of 
a  maze  of  difficulties.  Again  the  pragmatic  principle 
is  an  individual  rule,  which  can  be  made  and  remade  to 
suit  changing  demands.  Hence  it  is  opposed  to  Hegel's 
dialectic.  His  scheme  of  evolution  is  like  the  unwinding 
of  a  ball  of  string,  previously  wound  up  by  a  machine — 
the  machine  in  this  case  being  formal  logic.  Finally, 
there  is  opposition  to  the  spirit  of  Schopenhauer.  To 
the  pessimist  the  world  as  will  comes  to  consciousness, 
only  to  discover  the  futility  of  that  will.  To  the  prag- 
matist  there  is  no  cosmic  consciousness,  but  only  a  so- 
cial consciousness,  driving  the  more  powerful  on  to 
become  lords  of  this  earth.  If  there  were  an  essential 
affinity  between  the  pragmatists  and  the  Germans  it 
would  be  through  Nietzsche.  Those  overlords  of  the 
American  business  world,  whose  motto  is  "  success  at  all 
hazards,"  are  first-cousins  to  the  Teutonic  superman, 
who  works  in  a  realm  "  beyond  good  and  evil." 

So  the  rise  of  pragmatism  is  not  to  be  sought  in  the 
Fatherland  either  through  the  Anglo-Hegelians  or 
through  the  St.  Louis  school,  except  in  the  way  of  a  re- 
coil against  their  transcendentalism.  Fichte,  indeed, 
taught  in  his  Vocation  of  Man  that  things  in  them- 
selves are  as  we  make  them.  But  the  few  Fichtean  in- 
dividualists in  the  Middle  West  were  swallowed  up  by 
the  Hegelian  absolutists.  If  we  may  say  that  the  im- 
pulse to  pragmatism  did  not  come  from  Germany,  the 
case  is  not  so  clear  as  to  France.  The  unpracticality  of 
positivism  is  a  forgotten  phase  of  that  Gallic  cult  which, 
at  one  time,  had  such  a  vogue  in  America.  So  is  the 
mysticism  of  Comte's  later  days.  Unpracticality  is,  of 
course,  unpragmatie,  but  mysticism  is  not,  unless  the 
scheme  of  James  be  counted  a  form  of  perverted  prag- 
matism.    Consequently  there  is  a  curious  resemblance 


THE  SOURCES  OF  PRAGMATISM  329 

between  the  French  and  American  thinkers.     We  find 
Comte's  love  of  humanity  taking:  a  mystic  turn,  only 
after  he  had  exhausted  the  possibilities  of  the  sciences. 
Facts  were  one  thing,  feelings  another.    Hence  positivism 
had  as  its  supplement  that  religion  which  worsliips  hu- 
manity itself  as  Ic  grand  etre.     Of  this  worship  Comte 
considered  himself  the  high  priest,  as  shown  in  his  Posi- 
tive Catechism,  or  Summanj  Exposition  of  the  Universal 
Religion.    But  such  documents  came  forth  a  generation 
before    they    could    have    directly    influenced    "William 
James.     For  the  latter 's  mysticism  we  must  therefore 
seek,  not  a  foreign,  but  a  native  and  more  intimate 
source.    Henry  James,  Sr.,  was  the  leader  of  American 
Swedenborgianism,  and  to  this  fact  we  may  trace  the 
son's   inherited   interest   in   a   cult  which  taught   the 
primacy  of  the  emotional  imagination.     This  reversion 
to  a  youthful  form  of  thought  goes  far  to  explain  the 
motives  that  turned  James  the  scientist  into  James  the 
religionist.     Among  the  Varieties  of  Religious  Experi- 
ence we  find  many  cases  like  those  of  the  seer  of  Stock- 
holm.   In  the  Will  to  Believe  there  is  also  advocated  the 
"  right  to  believe  "  in  the  celestial  world.    Finally  in  the 
riuralistic  Universe  there  is  presented  that  hierarchy  of 
superhuman  beings,  which  have  a  family  likeness  to  the 
Swedenborgian  conception  of  the  world  as  a  progressive 
spiral  of  perfectibility.    To  read  the  chapter  "  Concern- 
ing Fechner,"  with  its  earth-soul  and  its  multi-verses,  is 
like  reading  the  Eartlis  in  the  Universe  and  the  Heavenly 
Arcana. 

All  this  has  been  called  the  logic  of  irrationalism.  It 
should  rather  be  called  a  reversion  to  a  type  of  tran- 
scendentalism. The  "faith  ventures"  and  "over- 
beliefs  "  which  James  advocat<>d.  were  much  like  the 
supersensible  faculties  and  Over-Soul  to  which  Emerson 


330  PRAGMATISM 

appealed.  In  short,  the  philosophers  of  Concord  and 
of  Cambridge  both  utilized  the  celestial.  One  said 
"  Hitch  your  wagon  to  a  star  ";  the  other — "  Hitch 
your  star  to  a  wagon,"  that  is,  accept,  for  the  time  be- 
ing, any  sort  of  a  creed,  provided  it  will  furnish  you 
with  motive  power. 

In  this  very  emotional  resemblance  there  nevertheless 
lurks  a  deeper  difference.  With  transcendentalism  the 
notion  of  truth  is  unconditional,  it  is  a  copy  of  a  higher 
reality.  With  pragmatism  truth  is  not  a  copy  but  a 
consistency;  there  is  nothing  in  your  mind  to  condition 
it  except  certain  racial  inclinations.  According  to  tran- 
scendentalism, truth  is  received  from  on  high.  According 
to  pragmatism,  truth  happens  to  an  idea;  it  becomes 
true,  is  made  true  by  events.  In  fine,  pragmatism  as 
radical  empiricism  means  simply  truth  as  you  go  along. 

This  casual  view  of  truth  may  be  called  the  hall-mark 
of  pragmatism.  It  is  that  which  differentiates  it  from 
previous  movements  native  and  foreign.  It  is  that  which 
puts  it  in  the  stream  of  present  tendencies,  the  rapid 
current  of  modernism,  which  washes  away  the  banks  of 
tradition.  As  with  "  new  "  art,  or  "  new  "  music, 
pragmatism  is  a  movement  opposed  to  the  dogmatic,  the 
absolute.  As  soon  as  a  notion  is  fixed,  a  scheme  sys- 
tematized, it  moves  restlessly  on.  The  spur  of  dissatis- 
faction of  Peirce  leads  on  to  the  test  of  satisfaction  of 
Dewey,  and  this  in  turn  to  the  fresh  emotional  responses 
of  James.  To  picture  pragmatism  is  to  picture  a  rapid 
stream,  eating  away  the  fixed  landmarks  of  custom  and 
convention.  A  radical  upholder  of  pragmatism  has  gone 
so  far  as  to  compare  it  to  an  evolutionary  Niagara,  whose 
being  is  doing,  whose  end  is  action. 

To  judge  of  the  movement  by  one's  emotional  response, 
it  gives  one  first  a  feeling  of  ease,  of  floating  with  that 


THE  CRITICS  OF  PRAG^IATISM  331 

current  of  modernism  wliich  is  no  longer  confined  by  the 
canons  of  art,  or  literature,  or  religion.  It  next  gives  one 
a  feeling  of  being  lost,  of  being  carried  on  in  a  waste  of 
waters,  not  only  without  bottom  but  without  banks.  This 
is  a  mixed  feeling  and  it  leads  to  a  mixed  conclusion, 
and  that  is  that  pragmatism  is  not  a  conclusive  philos- 
ophy, but  only  a  transitional  era  in  thought.  Witli 
Peirce  it  is  a  mere  method ;  with  Dewey  a  useful  tool ; 
while  with  James  it  leads  not  to  a  system  but  a  scheme, 
which  may  contain  such  inconsistencies  as  a  pluralistic 
monism,  and  free-willist  determinism, 

6.    The  Critics  of  Pragmatism 

"Whether  pragmatism  is  merely  a  transitional  era,  a 
transfonnation  phase,  a  form  of  Protagoreanism  wliich 
presages  another  Plato — is  hard  for  an  American  to 
decide.  The  s\\nmmer  in  the  flood  is  apt  to  lose  his  bear- 
ings. This  being  the  case,  let  us  turn  to  fon-ign  opinions 
for  a  decision.  We  have  the  picture  of  pragmatism ;  let 
us  hang  it  in  the  international  gallerj'  and  obtain  the  ver- 
dict of  an  impartial  jury.  From  this  juiy  we  must  ex- 
clude the  English  pragmatists,  because  they  are  too  much 
of  a  single  philosophic  family,  although  we  should  par- 
ticularly like  to  accept  the  opinion  of  Schiller  of  Oxford 
when  he  calls  "William  James  "  the  last  great  emanci- 
pator of  the  human  spirit." 

The  Germans  wo  must  exclude  for  the  opposite  rea- 
son. They  have  been  violent  detractors  of  pragmatism, 
possibly  because  they  have  for  once  been  caught  napping 
in  the  speculative  race.  Even  the  urbane  James  cannot 
stand  their  strictures,  and  accuses  them  of  being  misin- 
terpreters  of  the  movement.  With  the  other  Continental 
critics  it  is  different.    It  is  the  Latins  who  are  especially 


332  PRAGMATISM 

fitted  to  interpret  our  ways  of  thinking — ^the  French  for 
their  clarity  of  style  and  luminous  vision,  the  Italians 
for  their  penetrating  practicality  and  social  instincts. 
We  begin  with  the  Gauls  because  they,  in  a  sort  of  liter- 
ary revenge  for  the  material  partition  of  their  country, 
have  become  adepts  in  the  intellectual  delimitation  of 
other  realms.  Many  of  these  critical  Cffisars  are  known 
for  their  commentaries,  but  not  all.  We  are  familiar 
with  the  conquerors  and  classifiers  of  the  dark  continent 
of  Kant,  but  not  with  those  of  the  land  of  James.  Here 
is  a  new  race,  they  exclaim;  no  one  has  understood  it; 
let  us,  therefore,  undertake  the  task  of  setting  in  order 
these  transatlantic  barbarians.  When,  says  Marcel 
Hebert,  I  first  heard  the  word  pragmatism,  I  fancied  it 
was  a  sort  of  American  slang — a  useful  practical  formula 
to  put  truth  at  the  service  of  men  of  affairs  and  men  of 
action,  men  not  particular  as  to  the  point  of  view  of  logic 
and  criticism.  But  the  interest  with  which  their  books 
have  been  welcomed  in  Latin  countries  has  undeceived 
me.  It  appears  that  there  are  so  many  excellences  and 
also  so  many  paradoxes  in  the  system  that  it  would  be 
useful  to  explain  them  in  their  broad  outline. 

In  the  same  manner  J.  Bourdeau  refers  to  pragmatism 
as  a  system  to  be  expected  of  Yankees,  because  it  is  a 
philosophy  of  results,  a  philosophy  of  action,  a  philos- 
ophy of  profits.  It  is  in  harmony  with  the  American 
attitude  towards  science,  which  puts  Edison  and  Morse 
in  the  first  rank,  Ampere  and  Fresnel  in  the  second. 
Nevertheless,  for  all  its  insistence  on  the  practical,  it 
has  its  good  points.  One  may  expect  from  a  semi-bar- 
barous race  only  a  philosophy  of  engineers,  merchants, 
brokers;  yet  that  philosophy  is  an  excellent  antidote  to 
an  aristocratic  intelleetualism,  disdainful  of  conse- 
quences.    In   France   the    prestige   of  ideas  has  been 


THE  CRITICS  OF  PRAGMATISM  333 

abused,  the  people  have  become  soft,  the  classes  over- 
civilized.     Hence  the   value  of  the   pragmatist  as  an 
apostle  of  energy,  a  philosopher  who  proves  his  ideas  not 
by  dreaming  them,  but  by  acting  them.    In  short,  prag- 
matism is  a  practical  matter,  obvious  to  men  of  affairs, 
"  business  men,"  plutocrats  by  economic  power  and  the 
conquest  of  material  comfort.    Now,  while  there  is  to  be 
recognized  in  pragmatism  the  Anglo-Saxon  instinct  with 
its  skepticism  of  pure  ideas  and  its  disregard  of  general 
notions,  its  love  of  empiricism  and  its  aversion  to  com- 
plexity of  thought,  yet  there  are  in  France  men  not 
without  affinities  with  James  and  Pcirce.    Thus  Bergson 
attacks  the  so-called  general  truths  of  science,  and  traces 
the  hypothesis  to  a  personal  source.     So,  too,  Maurice 
Blondel  advocates  a  method  which  would  confront  the 
various   systems  of  intellectualism,   from   Descartes  to 
Taine,  from  the  point  of  view  of  practical  consequences. 
This  attitude  of  gleaning  the  practical  factors  from 
rationalistic  systems  is  what  Abel  Roy  designates  as  the 
new  tone  in  philosophy.    It  is  not  an  eclectic  positivism, 
for  positivism  lays  too  much  stress  on  pure  science,  and 
tends  to  disregard  the  emotional  and  passional  side  of 
life.     Nor  is  it  the  French  neo-criticism  which  piously 
hands  down  the  traditions  of  absolutism  from  Descartes 
to  Hegel.    The  latter  group  of  thinkers  is  a  mere  sur\-ival 
of  the  past;  somewhat  fossilized,  it  has  not  taken  ac- 
count of  the  anti-intellectual  and  mystical  current,  which 
starts   with   Schelling  and  Schopenhauer   in  their  re- 
habilitation of  the  indeterminate,  the  unconscious,  the 
irrational.    Hence  it  is  that  recourse  should  be  had  to 
the  aspirations  of  the  heart,  to  the  obscurer  instincts  of 
humanity.    True  knowledge  is,  in  fine,  to  be  sought  not 
from  positivistic  science,  not  from  proud  intellectualism, 
but  in  the  intuitions  of  sentiment,  in  moral  ideas,  in  re- 


334  PRAGMATISM 

ligious  beliefs.  ...  Of  all  these  pragmatism  is  the 
synthesis. 

From  the  French  critics  thus  far  cited  it  is  evident 
that  the  western  Goth  is,  after  all,  not  so  barbarous,  but 
well  in  the  vanguard  of  progress.  At  the  last  Interna- 
tional Congress  of  Philosophy  Emile  Boutroux  showed 
how,  of  the  two  dominant  groups  of  thought,  the  prag- 
matists  have  assumed  the  most  advanced  position.  On 
the  one  hand  are  the  intelleetualists  who,  completely 
satisfied  with  science,  believe  that  there  is  little  knowl- 
edge outside  its  boundaries.  On  the  other  are  the  anti- 
intellectualists,  who,  going  beyond  the  present  limits  of 
science,  honor  certain  irrational  powers  of  the  human 
soul,  such  as  instinct,  intuition,  the  sense  of  action. 
Berthelot  stands  for  the  former  group ;  inheritor  of  the 
doctrines  of  the  eighteenth  century,  successor  of  the 
Encyclopaedists,  he  makes  a  religion  of  science  and  be- 
lieves that  it  is  the  sole  irrefragable  foundation  for  the 
morality  of  races  as  well  as  of  individuals.  Up  to  1890, 
continues  Andre  Chaumeix,  such  a  role  was  held  by  sci- 
ence in  philosophy,  sociology,  and  morality.  But  in 
1893  Emile  Boutroux  maintained  against  the  mechanism 
and  materialism  of  the  scientists  the  notions  of  liberty 
and  spirituality.  Next,  Ferdinand  Brunetiere  followed 
with  his  attack  on  the  fallacies  of  science,  and  showed 
that  phenomena  are  always  in  formation  and  that  opin- 
ions must  be  modified  by  new  experiences.  Finally, 
Henri  Poincare,  criticising  the  values  of  the  sciences, 
showed  that,  in  place  of  the  fixity  of  general  ideas,  we 
must  hold  to  the  relativity  of  hypotheses,  that  the  sim- 
plicity of  nature  is  but  a  convenient  convention,  and 
that  scientific  formulae  are  but  approximate  accommoda- 
tions to  reality. 

Such  are  the  Franco-American  affiliations,  the  points 


THE  CRITICS  OF  PRAGMATISM  335 

of  sympathy  which  have  brought  about  a  philosophic 
entente  cordiale  between  the  two  republics,  and  have  led 
to  the  visits  to  our  shores  of  two  such  distinguished 
thinkers  as  Emilc  Boutroux,  head  of  the  Fondation 
Thiers,  and  Henri  Bergson,  author  of  Creative  Evolution. 
These  are  the  affiliations;  naturally  there  are  accompany- 
ing differences.  Briefly  there  are  two, — one  of  them  re- 
specting learning,  the  other  religion.  The  contempt  for 
culture  strikes  all  the  French  observers  as  an  earmark  of 
the  Anglo-American  movement.  Bourdeau  shows  how 
the  hostility  to  rationalism  makes  a  tabula  rasa  of  all  that 
is  not  English  or  American.  Descartes,  Leibniz,  and 
Kant  do  not  exist  for  the  pragmatist ;  with  him,  as  with 
Herbert  Spencer  and  Lord  Bacon,  there  is  manifest  a 
positive  disdain  for  past  thought.  Chaumeix  has  noticed 
the  same  thing;  Rey  devotes  a  chapter  to  the  pragmatic 
disregard  for  the  traditional  solutions  of  the  problems 
of  truth ;  while  Hebert  neatly  turns  the  tables  by  asking 
if  these  contemners  of  the  past  have  not,  in  fact,  had 
numerous  predecessors.  The  latter 's  search  for  sources 
is  perhaps  carried  to  excess;  he  has  made  too  many  of 
the  historic  figures  pragmatists  unconscious  of  their 
pragmatism.  But  the  historical  comparison  is  the  only 
way  to  get  the  correct  perspective,  the  relative  point  of 
view  so  often  forgotten  by  transitionalists. 

The  second  point  of  difference  concerns  religion.  In 
this  there  are  two  opinions,  one  of  recoil,  the  other  of 
ridicule.  Hebert  estimates  American  pragmatism  from 
the  cautious  Catholic  point  of  view.  In  regard  to  the 
theistic  conception  he  agrees  with  James  that,  a.s  an  over- 
belief,  it  is  true  because  it  is  so  useful ;  but  he  reeoils  from 
the  representation  of  the  relation  between  man  and  the 
higher  spirits  as  that  of  dogs  and  cats  towards  their 
masters.     This  sort  of  Pickwickian  humor,  which  has 


336  PRAGMATISM 

attracted  other  Gallic  writers,  does  not  appeal  to  one  who 
holds  that  the  deity  is  an  object  of  worship,  not  merely 
because  he  is  primus  inter  pares,  but  because  he  is  the 
possessor  of  infinite  perfections.  To  this  modern  scholas- 
tic, then,  God  is  to  be  estimated  not  solely  ex  conse- 
quentiis,  but  rather  as  an  objective  reality  raised  far 
above  the  level  of  probability.  In  fine,  since  human  na- 
ture is  capable  of  seeing  for  the  sake  of  seeing,  of 
knowing  for  the  sake  of  knowing,  it  is  necessary,  over 
and  above  such  an  utilitarian  pragmatism,  to  affirm  the 
excellence  of  pure  disinterestedness. 

In  regard  to  mysticism  it  seems  to  Bourdeau  a  para- 
dox that  a  Yankee  philosophy  should  lead  to  such  a  result. 
While  the  French  critic  refers  this  to  a  reaction  against 
scientific  snobbism,  tracing  it  through  the  pragmatic  ap- 
peal from  the  intellect  to  the  emotions,  in  the  case  of 
James  an  American  might  prefer  to  trace  the  latter 's 
mystic  leanings  to  a  directly  inherited  interest  in 
Swedenborgianism.  But,  whatever  the  source,  it  is  a 
veritable  paradox  that  Occidental  thought  is  approxi- 
mating Oriental.  The  American  mind-cure  has  no  his- 
toric connections,  as  Bourdeau  would  hold,  with  the 
spiritual  exercises  of  Ignatius  de  Loyola.  Except  for 
the  Quakers,  mystic  manuals  have  had  little  vogue  among 
the  cultivated  classes  in  our  land.  Rather  should  this 
so-called  auto-imperialism,  this  revived  Yoga  system,  be 
traced  to  the  Platonic  element  in  New  England  Puritan- 
ism, and  more  especially  to  Emerson's  interest  in  the 
sacred  books  of  the  East.  It  is,  therefore,  not  untrue  to 
say  that  the  most  ingenious  of  the  modern  remedies 
against  the  evils  which  assail  us  was  discovered  in 
America  in  the  mind-cure,  the  gospel  of  relaxation,  the 
"  don't  worry  "  movement.  And  an  American,  cog- 
nizant of  this  degraded  form  of  New  England  transcen- 


THE  CRITICS  OF  PRAGMATISM  337 

dentalism,  this  perversion  of  the  Emersonian  doctrines  of 
self-reliance  and  compensation,  can  agree  with  tiu'  witty 
Gaul  when  he  compares  the  mind-cure  to  the  grindiu«j 
of  the  soul,  like  a  hand-organ,  for  the  sake  of  those  opti- 
mistic previsions:  "  Fata  viam  inveniant ;  tout  s'arraii- 
gera,  parbleu!  parfait!  bravo!  " 

In  pointing  out  the  deficiency  of  the  current  prag- 
matism from  the  point  of  view  of  theology  the  French 
criticism  has  reached  its  highest  point.  We  may,  there- 
fore, turn  to  the  Italian  attitude  towards  this  subject. 
It  is  Alessandro  Chiapelli  who  has  most  successfully  ox- 
posed  the  insufficiency  of  opportunism  for  the  deeper 
problems  of  thought  and  life.  To  him  the  recent 
renaissance  of  philosophy  in  America  and  France  lias 
shown  a  veritable  originality  of  the  speculative  spirit,  a 
new  restlessness  against  the  older  forms  of  thought.  The 
very  revolt  against  the  great  dogmatic  systems  has  in- 
cluded a  revolt  against  science  itself.  Pragmatism  is  a 
proof  of  this.  Its  very  discontent  with  intellectualism 
betokens  a  wider  vision.  In  giving  play  to  the  emo- 
tional and  the  passional,  in  empha.sizing  the  primacy  of 
will,  it  tends  towards  an  idealism  transcending  mere 
utilitarianism. 

Chiapelli  here  brings  to  notice  the  latent  idealism  in 
the  American  nature  with  which  the  primitive  prag- 
matist,  the  Yankee  exponent  of  mere  success,  is  bound  to 
reckon.  The  principle  of  Peirce,  which  resolves  our 
choice  of  speculative  systems  into  a  game  of  pitching 
pennies,  cannot  hold  indefinitely  in  a  land  which  ha.s 
k-nown  Emerson  and  harbored  Berkeley.  The  hitter's 
subjective  idealism  Chiapelli  considers  to  be  revived  in 
James's  humanism.  Whether  such  idealism  can  be  ren- 
dered objective,  and  therefore  serve  as  a  check  to  the 
radical  pragmatic  empiricism,   is  problematic. 


338  PRAGMATISM 

Italian  modernism  as  a  partial  reflection  of  the  new 
humanism  furnishes  a  suggestive  hint  as  to  the  theologic 
fate  of  American  pragmatism.  The  Italian  clergy  at 
first  eagerly  grasped  a  doctrine  which  would  rehabilitate 
a  waning  faith.  The  first  work  in  James's  trilogy 
gave  to  religious  beliefs  a  new  vogue.  But  the  second 
of  these  works  burned  the  fingers  of  the  orthodox.  The 
Fechnerian  hierarchy  of  world-souls  advocated  in 
A  Pluralistic  Universe  could  scarcely  be  understood, 
much  less  accepted,  outside  of  Swedenborgian  and  pos- 
sibly Mormon  circles!  The  Italian  critic  is,  therefore, 
right  in  presaging  little  success  amongst  us  for  this  re- 
vival of  animism  and  polytheism.  If  he  had  known  the 
rigors  of  monotheism  in  America,  he  might  justly  have 
called  James  a  sort  of  Yankee  Julian  the  Apostate.  In 
all  this  an  essential  weakness  of  pragmatism  is  implied. 
As  a  cosmology  it  is  an  historic  retrogression.  As  Chia- 
pelli  observes,  the  religious  conscience  has  reached  the 
highest  point  of  its  evolution  in  monotheism.  So  while 
a  pluralistic  conception  may  be  just,  as  a  natural  protest 
against  a  too  abstract  absolutism,  yet  ultimately  that 
pluralism  is  nothing  but  an  empirical  and  provisional 
view,  an  atomistic  form  like  that  of  the  cell  in  a  monad- 
ology. 

How,  then,  can  pragmatism  and  rationalism  be  recon- 
ciled ?  In  the  modern  renaissance  of  spiritual  values,  in 
the  attempts  to  complete  science,  justify  religion,  and 
ennoble  life,  there  is,  as  Chiapelli  declares,  something 
really  solemn.  In  the  rise  of  American  pragmatism  there 
is,  therefore,  more  than  a  grandiose  manifestation  of 
energy  brought  out  in  a  young  civilization  greedy  of 
imperialism.  Eather  is  it  a  new  philosophy  of  faith  and 
feeling  necessary  to  establish  the  human  equilibrium 
after  the  negations  of  agnosticism  and  the  limitations  of 


THE  CRITICS  OF  PRAGMATISM  339 

criticism.    For  these  words  from  a  foreign  observer  an 
American  may  be  grateful.    But  is  it  possible  to  bring 
about  that  suggested  reconciliation  between  pragmatism 
and  rationalism?     Hebert  had  expressed  a  pious  wish 
for  that  result,  in  his  hope  that  the  twentieth  century 
would  see  a  closer  union  of  positive  science  and  specula- 
tive philosophy.    And  while  Chiapelli  believes  that  the 
contrast   between  the   new   radical   empiricism   of   the 
pragmatists  and  the  rationalism  of  the  idealists  is  not  an 
irreducible  antinomy,  yet  he  confesses  that  their  approxi- 
mation may  be  indefinitely  prolonged.    He  aspires  to  a 
cooperation   between  natural  science   and  metaphysics, 
but  that  is  as  far  as  he  gets.    The  difficulties  of  the  co- 
operation are  too  great.     These  difficulties  are  brought 
out  by  one  of  our  compatriots,  to  whom  we  may  return 
as  a  final  critic  of  the  meaning  of  this  movement.     In 
his    article    on    the    "  Emancipation    of    Intelligence," 
Wendell  Bush  holds  that  the  idea  that  pragmatism  was 
an  apology  for  theism  has  seriously  interfered  with  the 
profitable  discussion  of  pragmatism  itself.     The  aim  of 
pragmatism  has  been  to  show  that  much  of  the  current 
subject-matter   in    philosophy    is    thoroughly   artificial. 
This  does  not  mean  that  guiding  philosophy  has  ceased 
to  exist,  but  only  that  it  has  changed  its  name  and  fled 
into  other  departments  of  our  universities,  where  chairs 
are  not  maintained  for  either  saving  the  supernatural, 
or  threshing  the  husks  of  idealism.     Under  the  present 
pragmatic  conditions,  then,  what  a  catalogue  of  problems 
disappears!     There  is  that  whole  list  of  animistic  sur- 
vivals—such as  God,  the  soul,  and  the  universe — con- 
cerning which    idealism   has   given   certain   a.ssurances. 
But  these  are  merely  imaginary  problems,  bound  to  dis- 
appear just  as  other  imaginary   problems  have  di.sap- 
peared.    The  work  of  the  pa.st  generation  is  now  bearing 


340  PRAGMATISM 

fruit.  Darwin's  Origin  of  Species,  Tyler's  Primitive 
Culture,  Frazcr's  Golden  Bough  have  brought  about  a 
condition  of  affairs  similar  to  that  at  the  beginnings  of 
modem  philosophy.  Pragmatism  is  indeed  but  a  new 
name  for  some  old  ways  of  thinking.  .  .  ,  The  thing  has 
happened  before.  Just  as  the  orthodox  metaphysicians 
must  have  thought  that  Descartes  ignored  most  of  the 
important  problems,  and  just  as  the  Cartesians  had  to 
break  away  from  the  metaphysics  of  the  Roman  Catholic 
institution,  so  we  have  to  cut  loose  from  the  metaphysics 
of  Protestant  speculation  and  from  whatever  is  simply 
incidental  to  it! 


CHAPTER  X 
NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  KEALISM 

In  going  from  the  old  to  the  new  realism  we  leave 
the  slow,  conservative  caravan  and  forge  ahead  into  the 
twentieth  century.  It  is  a  leap  of  nearly  two  generations 
to  catch  up  with  this,  the  most  modern  of  movements. 
In  this  long  interval  much  has  taken  place.  In  the  eyes 
of  the  present  generation  transcendentalism  with  its 
gorgeous  coloring  has  come  and  gone  like  autumnal 
foliage.  Absolute  idealism  with  its  cloud-capped  pin- 
nacles has  likewise  faded  away.  In  their  stead  has  arisen 
prosaic  pragmatism,  the  philosophy  of  practicality,  the 
creed  of  the  man  in  the  street,  a  working  hypothesis 
which  makes  truth  to  be  that  which  succeeds. 

It  is  out  of  this  atmosphere  of  the  actual  that  the 
new  plant  had  sprung;  that  will  be  plain  later.  Now, 
we  must  turn  back  in  order  to  effect  a  junction  between 
the  two  allied  forces.  It  is  safe  to  say  that  the  new  real- 
ism is  a  movement  purged  of  the  faults  of  the  old  and  in- 
vigorated by  the  struggle  with  its  rivals.  Because  of  its 
undisputed  sway,  the  old  grew  dogmatic,  then  weak  and 
senile,  but  the  new  has  been  strengthened  by  a  struggle 
with  powerful  rivals.  Between  the  old  and  the  new 
realism  lay  the  tortuous  road  of  various  idealisms;  by 
traveling  along  this  road  and  grappling  with  these  giants 
the  youngest  of  the  philosophies  has  gained  its  vigor. 

The  story  of  the  rise  of  neo-realism  is  interesting.  Its 
prophet  was  Frederick  Woodbridgo,  who  in  his  presiden- 
tial address  before  the  Western  Philosophical  Associa- 

841 


342  NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM 

tion  suggested  some  of  the  lessons  to  be  learned  from  the 
historical  method  of  handling  the  problem  of  meta- 
physics. Such  was  the  futility  of  the  distinction  be- 
tween appearance  and  reality;  the  necessity  of  an  inde- 
pendent metaphysics;  the  need  of  a  logic  of  definition. 
.  .  .  This  was  in  1903.  Six  years  later,  at  the  New  Haven 
meeting  of  the  American  Philosophical  Association,  six 
of  the  younger  members  happened  to  find  themselves  in 
agreement  on  certain  points  raised  in  the  daily  discus- 
sion. Five  of  them  represented  the  old  colonial  founda- 
tions, from  Harvard  southward  to  Princeton.  They 
were  familiar  with  the  former  traditions  of  the  Atlantic 
seaboard,  but  with  these  traditions  they  found  they  were 
out  of  sympath3^  The  abstract,  the  a  priori,  from  Kant 
to  Lotze,  had,  been  dinned  into  their  ears  until  they 
longed  for  a  change  in  the  tune.  They  decided  to  change 
it  for  themselves.  The  first  task  was  to  get  rid  of  the 
everlasting  epistemology,  the  constant  resolving  of  all 
problems  into  the  problem  of  knowledge.  How  do  I 
know?  What  do  I  know?  Do  I  really  know? — such 
questions  had  resulted  in  sterile  quibbles,  and  yet  all  this 
time  the  scientists,  whether  sociologists,  psychologists,  or 
biologists,  were  digging  up  rich  raw  material  with  no- 
body to  turn  it  into  the  finished  philosophical  product. 

The  richness  of  reality,  direct  awareness  of  the  world 
— these  are  the  prime  marks  of  the  new  philosophy.  In- 
stead of  thin  abstraction,  our  eyes — if  we  will  only  look 
— may  see  a  thick  crust  of  facts,  constantly  growing 
thicker.  Science,  law,  politics,  religion — these  are  the 
rivers  which  are  bringing  down  the  rich  alluvial  de- 
posits. The  absolutists,  the  high  idealists,  directed  our 
gaze  to  the  mountain  peaks;  but  those  arid  regions  of 
pure  abstraction  are  to  us,  they  say,  not  half  so  worth- 
while as  the  lower  levels  of  concrete  reality.    Here  are 


NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM  343 

valleys  of  decision  where  problems  must  be  solved,  prob-  \ 
lems  of  actual  life.  Let  us.  tliorcfore,  cut  up  this  land,  \ 
pick  out  our  patches,  and  cultivate  our  own  gardens. 

As  is  natural  with  any  fresh  movement,  the  new  real- 
ism declares  itself  against  tradition.    Like  the  ver>'  tran- 
scendentalism against  which  it  is  a  protest,  it  starts  with 
a  polemic.     But  the  protest  and  the  polemic  are  not 
expressed  in  a  tone  of  irritation.     A  marked  excellence 
of  the  school  is  its  very  knowledge  of  tlie  schools.     It 
has  now  reached  a  class-consciousness  and  seeks  to  relate 
itself  to  other  forms  of  thought.     The  relation  of  the 
new  realism  to  Kant  is  best  seen  in  its  attitude  towards 
the  philosophers  after  Kant.     With  them  it  abandons 
the  thing-in-itself.    But  there  the  agreement  stops.    Let 
us  put  the  matter  in  this  way.    There  are  certain  castles 
on  the  Rhine  which  the  Hegelians  built  and  from  which 
they  looked  down  as  overlords  over  the  valley  of  reality. 
With  the  legislative  powers  conferred  by  Kant  some  of 
them  went  so  far  as  to  view  consciousness  as  the  source 
not  only  of  the  a  priori  forms  of  relations,  but  of  all 
relations  whatsoever.  This  overlordship  was  carried  even 
further.     The  little  lords  were  swallowed  up  in  a  su- 
preme lord.     The  result  was  that  our  various  empirical 
selves  and  the  objects  of  their  experience  were  all  re- 
garded as  the  manifestations  or  fragments  of  a  single, 
perfect,  all-inclusive,  and  eternal  self. 

Idealistic  absolutism !  The  successors  of  the  cautious 
philosopher  of  Koenigsberg  talk  at  times  as  if  they  had 
come  into  possession  of  a  Holy  Roman  Empire.  But 
the  road  which  leads  to  Rome  splits  into  two.  From 
absolutism  there  arises  the  dilemma  of  dualism,  a  new 
dualism  of  the  finite  and  a])solute.  Eitjier  the  experi- 
ence of  the  fragment  embraces  the  cxperienc£L  oL.the 
"absolute  or  it  does  not.     If  the  former,  then  the  abso- 


344  NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM 

lute  becomes  knowable  only  at  the  cost  of  losing  its 
absoluteness  and  being  reduced  to  a  mere  "  state  "  of 
the  alleged  fragment.  The  existence  of  the  absolute  will 
then  be  known  by  its  own  fragments  and  each  frag- 
mentary self  will  have  to  assume  that  its  own  experience 
constitutes  the  entire  universe.  This  is  solipsism  or 
subjectivism.  If  the  other  horn  of  the  dTlerama  be 
chosen  and  the  independent  reality  of  the  absolute  be 
insisted  upon,  then  it  is  at  the  cost  of  making  the  abso- 
lute unknowable.    This  is  agnosticism  or  phenomenalism. 

The  road  has  ended,  but  only  in  two  blind  alleys — 
solipsism  and  agnosticism.  And  now  enter  upon  this 
troubled  scene  the  new  realists,  offering  ways  of  escape. 
The  escape  from  solipsism  is  to  go  back  to  that  pri- 
mordial common  sense  which  believes  in  a  world  that 
exists  independently  of  the  knowing  of  it.  The  escape 
from  agnosticism  is  to  believe  that  that  same  independ- 
ent world  can  be  directly  presented  in  consciousness  and 
not  merely  represented  or  copied  by  "  ideas." 

The  impression  gained  from  this  general  confession 
of  the  realistic  faith  is  one  of  healthy  objectivism.  The 
younger  realists  look  upon  the  world  with  no  jaundiced 
eye  of  solipsism.  To  them  the  world  is  no  eject  of 
the  subject,  no  piece  of  human  imagery,  but  its  texture  is 
made  of  other  stuff  than  mere  thought.  It  is  this  that 
leads  to  a  new  proclamation  of  emancipation.  The 
emancipation  of  metaphysics  from  epistemology  is  neces- 
sary because  of  the  latter 's  dogmatic  claims.  The  a 
priori  philosopher  who  made  metaphysics  to  be  the  sci- 
ence of  the  possibility  of  knowledge  has  considered  that 
he  alone  can  spy  out  the  promised  land.  The  truth  of 
the  matter  is  that  there  are  things  not  dreamt  of  in  his 
philosophy — all  the  startling  discoveries  and  inventions 
of  the  modern  age  from  wireless  telegraphy  to  X-ray 


NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM  345 

photography.  Indeed  there  is  no  discipline  that  can  lay 
down  for  all  time  to  eonic  the  main  outlines  of  the  world 
as  the  possible  object  of  scientific  research.  Even  logical 
propositions  do  not  come  into  being  or  get  created  by 
the  student  that  first  learns  that  they  arc  true.  They 
are  discovered  and  not  made,  as  truly  as  was  the  Ameri- 
can continent  discovered  and  not  made  by  the  explorers 
of  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries.  Furthermore, 
by  its  very  claims  to  certainty  episteinology  has  betrayed 
its  limitations.  It  has  sought  a  kind  of  metaphysical 
trust  which  maps  out  the  territory  and  will  brook  no 
rivals. 

Now,  under  the  new  regime,  continues  Marvin,  the 
a  priori  must  give  way  to  the  a  posteriori,  preconception 
to  conception,  as  the  ultimate  crucial  test.  Indeed  it  is 
asserted  that  not  only  is  the  theory  of  knowledge  sub- 
sequent to  logic,  but  it  is  subsequent  also  to  some  of  the 
special  sciences,  such  as  physics  and  biology.  As  to  what 
knowledge  is  possible  man  has  never  succeeded  in  getting 
trustworthy  information  except  empirically.  In  case 
after  case  man  has  been  able  to  discover  what  scholars 
in  another  age  pronounced  unknowable.  We  have  been 
able  to  study  the  chemistry  and  temperature  of  the 
stars,  we  can  weigh  the  planets,  we  can  tell  w'ith  com- 
plete accuracy  the  area  of  curved  figures  whose  sides 
stretch  out  to  infinity.  The  place,  then,  of  the  science 
of  knowledge  among  the  other  sciences  is  humble.  It  is 
not  the  head  of  the  hierarchy,  inasmuch  as  it  does  not 
give,  but  presupposes,  the  theory  of  knowledge.  The 
weakness  of  that  discipline  is  that  in  claiming  to  be  both 
the  beginning  and  the  end  of  the  various  forms  of  knowl- 
edge it  works  in  a  vicious  circle.  Instead  of  being  funda- 
mental it  is  in  many  cases  superficial,  being  saturated 
with  the  scientific  prejudices  of  the  day  and  generation 


346  NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM 

of  its  author.  Thus  there  is  good  reason  to  believe  tliat 
the  great  Kant  himself  could  not  escape  the  Newtonian 
conception  in  drawing  many  of  his  conclusions.  In 
short,  it  is  impossible  for  the  a  priori  philosopher  to  jump 
out  of  his  environment  and  vain  for  him  to  write  pro- 
legomena to  any  future  metaphysic. 

The  author  here  compares  the  old  epistemology  to  a 
"  salted  "  mine  in  which  the  most  valued  ore  has  been 
put  not  by  nature,  but  by  human  hands.  But  such  a 
hardened  "  promoter  "  will  continue  to  promote  in- 
tellectual distrust  so  long  as  he  tries  to  tease  out  a 
world  hypothesis  by  dialectic  rather  than  to  devote  him- 
self to  a  modest,  open-minded,  and  industrious  study  of 
the  cognitive  facts.  So  the  old-fashioned  rationalist 
must  give  way  to  the  neo-realist,  for  no  careful  philoso- 
pher would  offer  mankind  to-day  the  amount  of  a  priori 
information  Kant  claimed  to  derive  by  means  of  his 
transcendentalism.  And  yet  we  are  learning  much  from 
the  sciences  to-day  regarding  subjects  that  were  once 
merely  presumptive  knowledge — the  nature  of  the 
heavenly  world,  the  nature  of  matter,  the  nature  of  life, 
and  the  nature  of  mind. 

We  can  put  this  in  another  way.  Appeal  to  the  prag- 
matic test,  the  verdict  of  history,  and  ask  to  what  dis- 
coveries or  doctrines  of  the  past  two  hundred  years  is 
our  present-day  metaphysics  especially  indebted,  to 
epistemology  or  to  the  progress  of  the  natural  sciences  ? 
We  can  go  even  further,  take  one  of  the  oldest  of  the 
metaphysical  problems,  the  nature  of  matter.  In  the  last 
few  years  we  seem  to  be  learning  more  concerning  the 
make-up  of  matter  than  man  succeeded  in  discovering 
in  the  preceding  two  thousand  years.  Even  such  a  hoary 
conviction  as  that  mass  is  an  absolute  constant  is  now 
contradicted.    What  could  be  more  startling  than  to  be 


NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM  347 

told  that  electricity  is  an  all  but  fundamental  concept  in 
the  new  philosophy  of  nature?  A  thousand  years  of 
transcendentalism  or  of  any  other  theory  as  to  what  mat- 
ter must  be,  in  order  to  be  a  possible  experience,  could 
not  have  revealed  to  us  such  truths.  For  these  reasons 
we  claim  that  metaphysics  should  be  emancipated  from 
epistemology,  for  the  growth  of  science  can  again  revo- 
lutionize metaphysical  sciences  as  it  did  in  the  days  of 
Galileo. 

Marvin's  emancipation  of  metaphysics  from  epistemol- 
ogy is  a  negative  or  rather  a  privative  aspect  of  the  new 
realist.  A  positive  defense  is  offered  in^erjy's  theory 
of  independence.  In  emphasizing  their  emancipation  the 
new  thinkers  declare  themselves  freed  from  their  previ- 
ous condition  of  servitude  to  the  old  idealism.  Moreover, 
in  making  a  declaration  of  independence  they  draw  up 
a  bill  of  particulars  against  that  despot,  the  Absolute. 
No  longer  do  they  look  to  an  all-knower,  an  universal 
consciousness  in  order  to  learn  what  to  do.  They  do 
not  even  make  an  humble  remonstrance,  but  boldly  de- 
clare that  both  the  absolute  consciousness  and  the  indi- 
vidual consciousness  are  unnecessary  for  the  fact  of  exist- 
ence. Things  are  independent  of  being  known.  "Whether 
as  a  matter  of  fact  they  are  known  or  unknown,  the  rela- 
tion of  awareness  is  merely  accidental;  it  is  not  essential. 

Spaulding  next  takes  up  analysis  as  the  discovery  in 
a  whole  of  elements  or  parts  which  exist  independently 
of  the  analysis  and  discovery.  This  is  not  the  prag- 
matic analysis  which  is  simply  an  intellectual  instru- 
ment, a  mode  of  adaptation,  with  an  emphasis  on  the 
humanistic  interpretation  and  its  tendency  towards  .sub- 
jective idealism.  Nor  is  it  the  analysis  of  the  type  of 
Bergson,  who  arrives  at  the  position  that  everything  is 
change,   flux,  evolution,  with  such  an  interpenetration 


348  NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM 

of  parts  that  there  are  no  lines  of  separation,  but  only 
one  great  viscous  or  mobile  fluid,  the  whole  being  a  con- 
tinuous, flowing,  trembling  jelly.  Such  a  view,  with  its 
tendency  toward  monism,  serves  to  make  analysis  iden- 
tical with  falsification,  for  such  analysis  would  make 
the  finding,  or  inventing,  or  constructing  of  the  parts  to 
be  in  contradiction  of  the  whole.  For  Bergson  anything 
short  of  one  all-inclusive,  interpenetrated,  evolving  whole 
is  contradictory  and  so  false  and  not  real.  The  creative 
evolutionist  has  proceeded  on  the  view  that  analysis  is 
destructive,  that  to  articulate  the  skeleton  is  to  kill  the 
animal.  But  the  neo-realist  holds  that  such  is  not  neces- 
sarily the  case,  since  the  actual  world  of  physical,  chem- 
ical, and  physiological  facts  is  discontinuous  at  certain 
points.  It  may  be  that  one  kind  of  experience  finds,  in  a 
given  situation,  that  the  body,  the  time,  and  the  posi- 
tions, are  fused  and  interpenetrated  so  as  to  form  mie 
whole.  But  this  kinetoscopic  view  of  reality  which  makes 
every  entity  analyzed  to  be  continuous,  is  not  the  only 
view.  There  is  the  whole  atomic  world  in  which  analysis 
reveals  many  separate  existential  facts.  Yet  this  division 
into  parts  does  not  mean  a  wild  discreteness.  Certain 
substances  combine  in  more  than  one  proportion,  and 
these  proportions  are  rational.  Furthermore,  at  the 
present  stage  in  the  development  of  science,  molecules, 
atoms,  electrons,  and  the  relations  between  them,  must 
be  accepted  as  existing  in  quite  the  same  sense  as  do  the 
entities  which  they  explain. 

As  Perry's  theory  of  independence  led  to  Spaulding's 
defense  and  analysis,  so  the  two  combined  fit  into  Mon- 
tague's relational  theory  of  consciousness,  a  theory 
worked  out  several  years  prior  to  its  appearance  here. 
Objects  as  independent  need  no  consciousness  for  their 
existence.    Yet  objects  as  analyzed  disclose  a  network  of 


NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM  349 

relationships  between  objects  and  the  subject  consider- 
ing them.  This  suggests  an  hypothesis  which  avoids  the 
crudities  of  naive  realism  and  escapes  the  difficulties 
of  subjective  idealism.  The  fact  of  error  is  the  crucial 
test  in  all  these  theories.  The  old  realism  was  weak 
because  it  could  not  account  for  such  vagaries  a.s  the 
events  of  a  dream.  The  common-sense  theory  held  to 
a  world  of  objects  and  consciousness  like  a  searchlight 
playing  upon  those  objects ;  not  creating  them,  but  sim- 
ply revealing  them.  But  dreams  demolished  this  theory, 
for  it  could  give  no  account  of  events  outside  of  a  world 
of  beings  interacting  in  space  and  time.  So  the  pen- 
dulum swung  to  the  other  extreme  of  subjectivism  ac- 
cording to  which  the  world  in  which  we  live  is  conceived 
as  a  product,  fashioned  by  consciousness  from  the  raw 
materials  of  its  own  states.  The  searchlight  becomes 
a  projecting  camera,  consciousness  being  a  creative 
cause  of  that  which  it  beholds  or  is  pleased  to 
behold. 

At  this  point  arises  the  need  of  a  corrective  and  sup- 
plementary hypothesis.  The  old  realism  emphasized  ob- 
jective truths  and  suppressed  subjective  errors.  The 
old  idealism  found  it  hard  to  distinguish  between  truth 
and  error.  The  world  of  the  romantic  idealist,  for  all 
his  fine  words,  remains  but  a  world  of  shadow  pictures 
on  the  screen  of  consciousness.  The  true  and  the  false, 
•what  are  they?  To  the  neo-realist  they  are  respectively 
the  real  and  the  unreal  considered  as  objects  of  a  pos- 
sible belief  or  judgment.  There  is,  that  is  to  say,  the 
same  difference  between  what  is  real  and  what  is  true, 
as  between  George  Washington  and  President  George 
Washington.  President  George  Wa.shington  refers  to 
Washington  in  a  certain  relation  to  our  government. 
George   Washington   denotes   precisely   the  same  indi- 


350  NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM 

vidua!  without  calling  attention  to  the  presidential  rela- 
tion. 

This  is  the  first  example  given  in  the  relational  theory 
of  consciousness.  It  does  not  concern  itself  with  mere 
objects  or  mere  subjects,  but  with  what  are  usually 
called  existential  propositions.  To  it  the  real  universe 
consists  of  the  space-time  system  of  existents,  together 
with  all  that  is  presupposed  by  that  system.  Examples 
of  such  relations  and  propositions  are  such  as  these: 
Caesar  lived  before  Napoleon;  orange  resembles  yellow 
more  than  green.  All  this  may  seem  commonplace  and 
obvious.  But  a  distinction  is  to  be  made,  a  distinction 
which  will  clear  up  the  confusion  between  truth  and 
falsity.  Truth  and  falsity  never  attach  to  judgments 
as  acts,  but  to  propositions  as  objects.  There  would  be 
no  sense  in  calling  an  act  of  belief  as  such  either  true  or 
false.  If  we  wished  to  know  whether  certain  beliefs  that 
we  held  about  the  properties  of  triangles  were  true  or 
false,  whom  should  we  consult?  The  psychologist? 
Certainly  not.  We  should  go  to  the  mathematician. 
But  why  ?  The  psychologist  is  supposed  to  be  an  expert 
on  mental  processes,  and  if  the  adjectives  true  and  false 
were  to  apply  to  beliefs  as  mental  processes,  he  would 
be  the  one  to  settle  our  difficulties.  We  should  go  to  the 
mathematician,  however,  because  our  desire  to  know 
whether  our  beliefs  about  triangles  were  true  or  false 
could  be  satisfied  only  by  one  who  knew  about  triangles. 
So  with  all  cases  of  doubt  as  to  truth  and  falsity,  we 
go  to  the  person  who  knows  about  the  things  believed 
rather  than  to  him  who  knows  about  the  processes  or 
acts  of  believing. 

In  connection  with  the  subject  of  error  and  as  the 
result  of  his  varied  psychological  experiments,  Edwin 
Holt  seeks  to  find  the  place  of  illusion  in  a  realistic 


NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM  351 

world.  Illusion,  hallucination,  and  erroneous  experience 
in  general,  we  are  told,  can  have  no  place  in  a  universe 
where  everything  is  non-mental  or  real ;  and  they  cannot 
be  satisfactorily  accounted  for  by  a  realistic  philosophy. 
This  is  the  challenge  throughout  from  tiie  idealist  to  the 
realist  camp.  It  has  to  be  met  not  by  a  general  denial, 
but  by  specific  analysis.  First  come  errors  of  space. 
For  example,  the  person  squinting  his  eyes  sees  double, 
that  is,  what  is  not  there ;  hence,  reasons  the  idealist,  the 
illusory  object  is  essentially  mental  and  subjective. 
Nothing  of  the  sort,  responds  the  realist,  it  is  only  a  case 
of  mechanical  manipulation  of  the  eyes.  The  stereo- 
scopic camera  also  sees  double.  So  with  the  case  of 
errors  of  time.  The  idealists'  hallowed  illustration  of 
seeing  some  distant  star  some  millions  of  years  behind 
time,  or  millions  of  years  after  it  may  bo  said  to  exist, 
does  not  make  the  image  merely  mental.  The  camera 
does  the  same  thing ;  every  image  there  lags  in  strikingly 
the  same  way  behind  its  real  physical  prototype.  The 
ease  of  seeing  the  known  existing  sun  does  not  raise  the 
issue  between  reality  and  unreality,  or  between  the 
material  and  the  mental,  nor  does  the  case  of  secondary 
qualities.  The  colors  of  the  landscape  may  change,  yet 
the  chemical  properties  of  the  hill  and  wood  that  one 
looks  out  upon,  are  practically  invariable  in  their  chemi- 
cal properties.  Luminous  properties  may  change,  but 
this  is  due  to  the  incident  illumination  which  brings 
the  perpetual  variety  of  light,  shade,  and  hue.  The 
orthochromatic  moving  film  will  record  this  diurnal 
flux  in  an  entirely  parallel  way.  In  short,  we  may 
overthrow  the  idealist's  contention  as  to  a  remarkable 
creative  function  inherent  in  mental  processes,  by 
pointing  out  parallel  phenomena  in  the  material  world. 
The  last  of  the  chapters  of  the  composite  work  on  new 


352  NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM 

realism  is  remarkable  in  disclosing  a  sort  of  civil  war, 
an  internecine  struggle  between  the  scientists  themselves. 
The  strongest  influences  against  realism  to-day,  says  Pit- 
kin, emanate  from  the  biological  sciences.  Only  a  few 
years  ago  it  was  physics  and  mathematics  which  made 
the  natural  world-view  seem  untenable ;  and  before  them 
it  was  logic  and  psychology.  But  from  a  new  quarter 
there  rises  a  host  of  adversaries,  declaring  that  the  un- 
answerable disproof  of  realism  is  found  in  simple  life 
processes.  Driesch  is  the  modem  leader  of  this  move- 
ment in  his  systematic  attempt  to  establish  idealistic 
vitalism  on  biological  evidences.  So,  too,  Bergson  pro- 
ceeds from  psychology  to  biology.  The  immediate  data 
of  consciousness  afford  a  new  basis  for  interpreting  life 
processes,  for  the  latter  reveal  a  cosmos  not  composed 
of  distinct  characters,  but  a  flux  wherein  everything  in- 
terpenetrates everything  else.  All  distinctions  are 
products  of  a  "  vital  force  ' '  and  serve  only  for  organic 
controls.  Driesch  concludes  that  the  entire  content  of 
experience  is  created  by  the  ego,  in  the  same  manner  as 
Kant  held;  Bergson  that  there  is  an  objective  flux  that 
constitutes  the  environment  of  the  vital  force. 

Against  the  vitalism  of  the  German  and  the  creative 
evolution  of  the  Frenchman,  Pitkin  holds  that  recon- 
struction must  begin.  Both  systems  contain  the  old,  dis- 
credited categories  of  idealistic  psychology.  The  former 
reverts  to  the  ancient  Aristotelian  entelechy,  or  internal 
perfecting  principle;  the  latter  maintains  that  knowl- 
edge can  never  give  us  the  "  real  thing,"  inasmuch  as 
it  gives  us  only  a  few  of  its  selected  characters.  Hence 
there  is  need  of  a  formal  analysis  of  the  biological  situa- 
tion, an  analysis  free  of  the  faults  of  hunting  for  an 
unknown  something  behind  the  organism,  or  of  making 
the  environment  a  hazy  entity.    Therefore  naturally  in- 


NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM  353 

specting  animals  and  their  circumstances  of  life  we 
find : — that  they  exist  in  a  world  larger  than  themselves ; 
that  this  world  sets  for  them  certain  difliculties;  tiiat 
some  individuals  overcome  these  difficulties;  that  those 
which  signally  overcome  the  difficulties  differ,  in  some 
observable  respects,  from  those  which  do  not. 

We  have  here  the  two  familiar  evolutionary  factors — 
organism  and  environment.  Shall  we  call  one  sub- 
jective, the  other  objective,  and  draw  a  line  of  division 
between  the  two?  The  realist  replies — No!  The  reac- 
tion of  the  organism  and  the  stimulus  of  a-nvironnn'iit 
are  simply  two  phases  of  one  unitary  process,  as  are  the 
two  poles  of  a  magnet.  Just  as  the  positive  pole  does  not 
take  something  from  nor  add  something  to  the  negative 
pole,  so  the  reaction  does  not  consist  in  selecting  some- 
thing from  the  stimulus  or  adding  to  it.  Each  gets  its 
character  from  its  relation  to  the  other.  Both  the  struc- 
ture and  function  of  an  organ  vary  with  some  variations 
in  the  external  stimulus,  but  this  variation  should  not  be 
called  a  qualitative  transformation.  There  is  merely  a 
change  from  behavior  of  one  character  to  belinvinr  of 
another  character.  For  instance,  a  dog  is  frequently 
docile  when  at  large  and  vicious  only  when  tethered. 
Would  anybody  say,  though,  that  in  turning  the  dog 
loose  we  change  his  quality  ?  Hardly :  for  the  new  cir- 
cumstances bring  the  dog  into  new  relations ;  and  it  is  in 
response  to  the  latter  that  it  now  behaves  differently. 
Now,  are  these  new  relations  real,  in  the  objective  sense, 
or  merely  creations  of  the  mind  ?  Are  we  to  dig  a  colos- 
sal chasm  between  phenomenal  and  noumenal,  between 
things  as  thought  and  things  in  themselves,  to  explain 
such  behavior?  The  task  is  unnecessary.  When  ani- 
mals, including  man,  adjust  themselves  to  their  environ- 
ments, it  is  because  there  are  resistances  and  positions 


354  NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM 

of  which  they  must  take  account.  Every  living  creature 
finds  itself  in  a  world  full  of  things  distant  from  it  and 
from  one  another  in  space  and  in  time.  Some  of  these 
things  it  seeks,  others  it  shuns;  and  the  precise  rela- 
tion of  particular  things  to  its  body  in  space  and  in  time 
is  a  life-or-death  matter.  We  conclude,  therefore,  that 
geometrical,  mathematical,  and  other  relations  are  genu- 
ine stimuli  in  the  very  sense  that  material  complexes 
are.  They  are  not  products  of  the  cognitive  reaction 
but  the  producers  of  it. 

Such  is  radical  realism,  a  system  hardly  held  before 
save  by  Aristotle  and  the  materialists.  Pitkin  con- 
fesses that  he  is  quite  aware  that  in  asserting  planes, 
angles,  numbers,  ratios,  to  be  stimuli  in  precisely  the 
same  sense  that  the  ether  waves  are,  he  is  exposing  him- 
self to  ridicule.  But  suppose  we  take  an  alternative 
hypothesis  and,  with  nearly  everybody  except  the  new 
realists,  describe  the  mathematical-geometrical  relations 
as  "  intellectual  abstractions,"  "  constructs,"  "  short- 
hand expressions,"  what  does  that  lead  to?  To  the  old 
idealism  which,  starting  with  space  and  time  as  crea- 
tions of  the  mind,  subjective  principles,  led  on  to  para- 
doxes which  can  be  solved  only  by  pronouncing  the  whole 
situation  '*  unreal."  Of  course  there  are  certain  ad- 
vantages in  this  parallelistic  hypothesis  which  puts  a 
phenomenal  world  alongside  a  noumenal.  It  avoids  the 
ego-centric  predicament  which  holds  that  a  tree  may  seem 
to  be  unmodified  by  being  perceived;  but  that  is  only 
because  I  know  not  all  that  is  happening  to  it.  Con- 
trariwise it  accepts  certain  processes  as  not  being  con- 
stituted by  the  cognitive  process  but  as  merely  running 
alongside  that  process.  Take  the  adaptation  of  the  flat- 
fish to  the  sea  bottom.  We  would  be  setting  up  a  one-to- 
one  correspondence  between  the  phenomenal  and  nou- 


NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM  355 

menal  orders  if  we  were  to  declare  that  each  disccmihlc 
pculiarity  in  tlie  fish's  adaptive  reaction  resulted  from 
some  peculiarity  in  its  noumenal  environment.  That  is, 
when  the  flatfish,  having  a  certain  hlue-gray  checker 
pattern  on  its  back  as  a  consequence  of  resting  upon  a 
blue-gray  checker  sea  bottom,  shifts  to  a  gray-l)rown  sea 
bottom  of  irregular  design  and  there  soon  develops  on 
its  back  a  gray-brown  pattern  of  irregular  design,  the 
difference  between  the  former  and  the  latter  noumenal 
situation  is  of  the  same  type  as  that  between  the  blue- 
gray  checker  and  the  irregular  gray-brown  pattern  of 
the  sea  bottom.  Nevertheless,  the  noumenal  difference  is 
not  a  difference  between  colors  and  space  forms,  for 
these  are  only  phenomenal.  Now,  according  to  the 
idealistic  biologj',  you  may  take  any  case  of  reaction 
and  describe  it  in  this  manner.  "With  Driesch  you  may 
say  that  space  is  phenomenal,  that  is,  a  form  of  experi- 
ence, and  not  a  form  of  the  physical  world  independent 
of  experience.  With  Bergson  you  may  say  that  mathe- 
matical-geometrical characters  are  static  artifacts  created 
by  the  vital  force.  The  scheme  is  plausible  but  it  has 
its  difficulties.  Chief  of  these  is  the  identity  of  indis- 
cemibles.  If  there  be  a  one-to-one  correspondence  there 
is  no  means  of  distinguishing  the  noumenal  order  from 
the  phenomenal.  The  old  epistemology  made  two  sys- 
tems. The  new  biology  of  animal  behavior  cannot  dis- 
tinguish the  two  systems.  On  the  contrary-  it  identifies 
tlie  pair,  reduces  it  to  a  single  system.  In  fine,  the  sup- 
position that  there  is  a  system  beyond  that  which  we 
perceive  is  gratuitous.  There  are  no  phenomena  and 
no  noumena,  but  only  things,  events,  conditions,  cir- 
cumstances— all  in  a  universe  which  no  mind  has  split 
into  two  realms. 

From  this  reduction  of  the  old  dualism  there  arises  a 


356  NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM 

sense  of  relief.  The  uncomfortable  sense  of  a  double- 
dealing  world  is  made  to  disappear.  No  longer  have  we 
one  leg  on  the  noumenal  and  the  other  on  the  prenomenal, 
but  both  are  planted  in  reality.  No  longer  is  the  knower 
a  twofold  being, — in  one  aspect  transcendental,  in  an- 
other empirical.  The  advantage  of  this  view  to  epis- 
temology  is  patent.  For  example,  in  accepting  the  full 
reality  of  space,  it  does  away  with  the  supposed  para- 
doxes of  distance  from  Zeno  to  Bergson.  It  also  does 
aAvay  with  the  difficulties  of  considering  space  as  either 
an  idea  or  a  mere  form  of  apprehension.  But  besides 
seeking  the  facts  of  geometry  in  the  world  order  the 
author  might  have  gone  further  and  applied  his  reason- 
ings to  ethics.  There  stands  that  irritating  neo-Hegelian 
doctrine  of  conduct.  To  say,  as  do  Royce  and  Miinster- 
berg,  that  we  are  bound  in  the  sphere  of  the  phenomenal, 
but  free  in  the  noumenal,  is  to  make  us  neither  bond  nor 
free,  but  morally  paralyzed  because  pulled  in  two  direc- 
tions at  once.  Now  by  doing  away  with  these  two  worlds 
the  sense  of  freedom  is  restored  and  this  is  a  second 
advantage  of  the  new  realism. 

A  third  advantage  is  the  possibility  of  making  modern 
philosophy  less  anthropocentric.  It  appears  that  a 
new  Galileo  is  needed  formally  to  analyze  the  broader 
features  of  the  world  in  which  the  individual  organism 
exists.  Now,  according  to  the  new  realism  and  in  de- 
cided contrast  to  the  old  realism,  introspection  is  not 
fundamental.  Outward  reality  is  far  richer  than  inward 
meditation.  All  that  consciousness  does  is  to  pick  out 
one  strand  of  the  complex  cosmic  net.  In  a  word, 
thought  is  not  creative  but  selective,  and  at  times  even 
negative  in  its  results.  As  Pitkin  summarizes  it,  thought 
is  only  one  phase  in  the  much  more  comprehensive  or- 
ganic process,  and  presumably  bears  pretty  much  the 


NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM  357 

same  relation  to  this  latter  that  the  cross-sectional  mo- 
tions in  some  one  plane  of  chcmism  bear  to  the  total 
chemism.  Suppose  one  might  peer  into  a  constellation 
of  corpuscles  with  a  microscope  of  transcendent  power. 
One  would  there  see,  from  any  one  given  point  of  \'iew, 
a  vast  tangle  of  motions,  and  yet  discover  nothing  that 
would  betray  the  peculiar  character  of  the  chemism ;  for 
all  the  motions  that  were  significant  might  occur  in 
planes  parallel  to  the  obscn'er's  line  of  vision,  and  their 
bearings  might  furthermore  lie  wholly  beyond  the  micro- 
scopic field. 

A  sense  of  relief,  a  feeling  of  freedom,  an  impression 
of  reserve, — these  are  three  valuable  qualities  of  the 
new  realism.  With  them  go  corresponding  difficulties. 
It  is  easy  to  demolish  the  high  towers  of  the  ambitious 
idealist,  in  so  far  as  they  are  projections  of  the  pure  in- 
tellect. It  is  not  so  easy  to  bring  that  intellect  do\N-n  to 
the  level  of  mere  experience.  Cognition  may  not  be 
creative,  yet  is  it  only  one  of  the  bodily  activities?  Can 
we  reduce  its  activities  to  the  same  order  as  the  extra- 
cognitive  conditions,  such  as  blood  temperature,  conduc- 
tion currents,  colloids,  and  all  the  host  of  material  fac- 
tors which  never  figure  discretely  in  the  natural  opera- 
tions of  cognizing  the  environment  and  reacting  to 
it  ?  In  raising  these  questions  the  writer  appears  to  favor 
an  affirmative  answer.  He  goes  further  and  says  that 
the  organism  in  "mental  activity"  throws  selected 
objects  upon  the  cognitive  field  no  less  physically  tlian 
it  throws  them  upon  the  retinas.  :Moreover,  "  attend- 
ing "  is  defined  as  a  stretching  out  toward  something; 
not  a  feeling  nor  a  knowing  nor  a  thinking,  but  a  going 
to  meet  or  to  find  some  environmental  character.  Indeed, 
the  author  adds,  it  would  conduce  to  clarity  both  in 
biology  and  psychology,  if  attention  were  admitted  to  be 


358  NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM 

a  general  organic  attitude  and  not  a  specialized  func- 
tion like  cognizing.  We  might  then  speak  of  the 
phagocytes  as  attending  to  bacteria  without  our  falling 
into  grotesque  panpsychism  or  idealism. 

Pitkin  further  supposes  that  what  a  man  does  is  not 
determined  primarily  by  something  which  philosophers 
call  vital  force,  psychoid,  or  ego,  but  that  behaviors  and 
attitudes  may  be  assumed  by  the  blood,  or  by  some  group 
of  cortical  cells.  Now,  if  the  realistic  biologist  has 
escaped  idealism  by  this  supposition,  has  he  not  fallen 
into  materialism?  He  admits  his  wish  to  escape  the 
suspicion  of  subjectivism,  but  has  he  not  committed  the 
equal  crime  of  rank  objectivism — reduced  the  psychic  to 
the  merely  physical?  The  question  is  hypothetical  and 
so  is  the  answer.  If  we  agree  to  define  the  physical 
world  as  the  spatio-temporal  system  exclusively,  then 
consciousness  is  not  physical,  for  the  projection  field,  or 
the  field  of  consciousness,  is,  in  the  strict  logical  sense 
of  the  adjective,  transverse  to  the  objects  projected  upon 
it.  But  though  consciousness  be  not  physical  this  does 
not  imply  that  the  objects  of  consciousness  are  not  physi- 
cal. Nor  does  it  even  implj'  that  cognitive  relations  are 
not  relations  between  physical  things. 

This  conclusion  seems  commonplace,  a  return  to  the 
old-fashioned  realism  where  common  sense  saw  in  the 
world  merely  minds  and  bodies  and  the  relations  between 
those  bodies.  And  yet  this  is  not  a  complete  statement 
of  the  content  of  the  new  realism.  Since  the  day  of 
Reid  and  Beattie  there  has  been  an  immense  enrichment 
of  the  world  both  on  the  subjective  and  objective  sides. 
Consciousness,  contends  the  biologist,  as  soon  as  it  is  in- 
vestigated, appears  as  a  feature  of  a  *'  big  situation." 
This  situation  involves  not  only  feeling  and  thinking,  but 
also  the  organism, — blood  and  sinew  and  nerves  and 


NOTES  ON  THE  NEW  REALISM  359 

impulses  and  appetites, — and  finally  physical  things, — 
electricity,  light,  matter.  This  is  the  final  word  of  the 
last  of  the  new  realists.  It  is  indeed  a  "  big  situation," 
containing  a  host  of  entities  which  are,  at  present, 
projectively  indiscernible,  because  we  do  not  possess  all 
the  possible  angles  of  vision.  How  many  such  projective 
constants  there  are  nobody  knows,  but  geometry,  physics, 
and  psychology  bring  forward  facts  indicating  that  the 
variety  of  types  is  exceedingly  great. 

We  leave  the  new  realism  in  this  its  hopeful  state.  Its 
motto  might  be  this:  New  worlds  for  old.  In  place  of 
a  disheartening  idealism,  which  makes  things  in  them- 
selves andiscoverable,  unless  by  the  aid  of  an  Absolute, 
it  puts  a  world  of  actuality.  In  place  of  those  specu- 
lative mountain  peaks  covered  with  the  fogs  of  the 
phenomenal  it  points  to  valleys  of  decision  whose  soil 
is  deep  and  whose  crops  are  rich. 


SELECT    BIBLIOGRArHY 

(Chief  authorities  are  starred) 

INTRODUCTORY 

Becelaere,  J,  L.  Van.  La  Philosophic  en  AmCriquc,  dcpnis 
les  origines  jusqu'd  nos  jours.    1904. 

Curtis,  M.  M.  In  the  Western  Reserve  University  Bulletin. 
1896. 

Jones,  Adam  L.    Early  American  Philosophers.    1898. 

Riley,  Woodbridge.  American  Philosophy:  The  Early 
Schools.    1907. 

Santatana,  George,    Winds  of  Doctrine.     1913. 

Tyler,  M.  C.    A  History  of  American  Literature.    1878. 

Wendell,  Barrett.    A  Literary  History  of  America.    1905. 

I.   PURITANISM 

1.   Philosophy  and  Politics 

Borgeaud,  Charles.    The  Rise  of  Modern  Democracy.    1S94. 
Friedenwald,  H.    The  Declaration  of  Independence.    1904. 
*  Merrlam,  C.  E.    American  Political  Theories.    1903. 
WiLLOUGHBY,  W.  W.    The  Nature  of  the  State.    1896. 

2.   The  New  England  Fathers 

Ellis,  G.  E.    The  Puritan  Age.    1888. 
Foster,  F.  H.     A  Genetic  History  of  the  New  England 
Theology.    1907. 
Uhden,  F.  II.    The  New  Englmd  Theocracy.    IS^S. 
Walker,  Williston.    Ten  New  England  Leaders.    1901. 

m 


362  SELECT   BIBLIOGRAPHY 

3.   The  Revolt  Against  Puritanism 

*  Allen,  Ethan.  Reason  the  only  Oracle  of  Man,  or  A 
Compenduous  System  of  Natural  Religion.    1784. 

II.    EARLY   IDEALISM 
1.    Samuel  Johnson 

Beardsley,  E.  E.  Life  and  Correspondence  of  Rev.  Samuel 
Johnson,  D.D.     1874. 

Colden,  Cadwallader.  The  Principles  of  Action  in 
Matter.    1751. 

*  Johnson,  Samuel.    Elementa  Philosophica.    1753. 
Porter,  Noah.    Bishop  Berkeley.    1885. 

2.   Jonathan  Edwards 
Allen,  Alexander  V.  G.    Jonathan  Edwards.    1890. 

*  Gardiner,  H.  N.    Jonathan  Edwards:  a  Retrospect.    1901. 

3.  Mysticism.     From  Quakerism  to  Christian  Science 
Friends'  Library.     (Ed.  Evans.)    1837-1850. 
Penn,  William.    No  Cross,  No  Crown.    1668. 

*  Riley,  Woodbridge.  The  Personal  Sources  of  Christian 
Science.    Psychological  Review.    1903. 

Woolman,  John.    Journal.     {Ed.  Whittier.)     1871. 

IIL   DEISM 

1.  The  English  Influences 

Cobb,  S.  H.  Pioneers  of  Religious  Liberty  in  America. 
1903. 

ScHERGER,  G.  L.    The  Evolution  of  Modern  Liberty.    1904. 

2.  The  Colonial  Colleges 

*  Chauncy,  Charles.     Benevolence  of  the  Deity.    1784. 
Dexter,  F.  B.    The  Literary  Diary  of  Ezra  Stiles.    1901. 
Mather,  Cotton.     Essay  for  the  Recording  of  Illustrious 

Providences.    1684. 


SELECT   BIBLIOGRAPHY  363 

*  Mather,  Cotton.    Reasonable  Religion.     1713. 

*  Mather,  Cotton.     The  Christian  Philosopher.     1721. 

3.   Phh^delphia  and  Franklin 

Ford,  P.  L.    Franklin  Bibliography.    1889. 
•Franklin,    Benjamin.     Works.     {Eds.    Bigelow,   Ford, 
Smyth.) 

4.   Virginia  and  Jefferson 

Foley,  J.  P.    The  Jeffersonian  Cyclopedia.    1900. 

*  Jefferson^  Thomas.  Works.  {Eds.  Ford,  Lipscomb, 
Bergh.) 

Tompkins,  H.  B.    Bibliotheca  Jeffersoniana.    1887. 

5.   Thomas  Paine 
•Paine,  Thomas.     Works.     {Ed.  Conway.) 

TV.   MATERIALISM 
1.   The  French  Influences 

BOUTMT,  Emile.  Elements  d'une  Psychologic  politique  du 
Peuple  americain.     1902. 

Dabney,  Robert  L.  The  Sensualistic  Philosophy  of  the 
Nineteenth  Century.     1875. 

Tocqueville,  Axexis  de.    Democracy  in  America.    1898. 

2.   Joseph  Priestley 

Brougham,  Henry.  Lives  of  Men  of  Letters  and  Science. 
1845. 

Martineau,  James.    Miscellanies.    1852. 

3.   Benjamin  Rush 

*  Rush,  Benjamin.    Diseases  of  the  Mind.    1812. 

4.   The  Minor  Materialists 

*  Buchanan,  Joseph.    Philosophy  of  Human  Nature.    1812. 


364  SELECT    BIBLIOGRAPHY 

V.    REALISM 
1.   The  Scottish  Influences 

*  McCoSH,  James.    The  Scottish  Philosophy.    1874. 

2.   The  Princeton  School 

*  Miller,  Samuel.    Retrospect  of  the  Eighteenth  Century. 
1803. 

WiTHERSPOON,  John.  Lectures  on  Moral  Philosophy.  1810. 
(American  Philosophical  Association  reprint.) 

3.    The  Lesser  Realists 

*  Beasley,  Frederick.  A  Search  of  Truth  in  the  Science 
of  the  Human  Mind.    1822. 

McCoSH,  James.    Realistic  Philosophy.    1887. 

VI.    TRANSCENDENTALISM 

1.    The  New  England  Movement 

Frothingham,  0.  B.  Transcendentalism  in  New  England. 
1903. 

*  GoDDARD,  H.  C.  Studies  in  New  England  Transcendental- 
ism.    1908. 

2,   Emerson 

*  Emerson,  R.  W.    Works.     {Riverside  Ed.) 

Sanborn,  Frank  B.,  and  Harris,  W.  T.  The  Genius  and 
Character  of  Emerson.    1885. 

VII.   EVOLUTIONISM 
1.    The  Forerunners  of  Evolutionism 

Hitchcock,  Edward.    The  Religion  of  Geology.     1851. 

*  Smith,  Samuel  Stanhope.  Essay  on  the  Causes  of  the 
Variety  of  Complexion  and  Figure  in  the  Human  Species. 
1810. 


SELECT    BIBLIOGRAl'IlY  305 

2.  The  Antagonism  of  Agassiz 

*  Agassiz,  Louis.    An  Essay  on  Classification.     1S57. 
Agassiz,  Mks.   E.  C.     Louis  Agassi::,  His  Life  and  Corre- 
spondence.   1SS5. 

Le  Conte,  Joseph.  Evolution,  Its  Evidences  and  Its  Rela- 
tion to  Religious  Thought.     1S91. 

3.  The  Reception  of  Darvstinism 

Cope,  E.  D.    The  Origin  of  the  Fittest.    1887. 
Dana,  James  Dwight.    Manual  of  Geology.    1891. 
GHiMAN,  D.  C.    Life  of  James  Dwight  Dana.    1899. 

*  Gray,  As.a.    Darwininana.    1878. 

McCoSH,  James.  The  Development  Hypothesis :  Is  It  Suf- 
ficent?    1876. 

McCoSH,  James.  Development;  What  It  Can  Do  and 
What  It  Cannot  Do.    1883. 

*  McCoSH,  James.  The  Religious  Aspect  of  Evolution. 
1890. 

Rankin,  IL  W.  The  Philosophy  of  Charles  Woodruff 
Shields.     1905. 

*  Shields,  Charles  W.    Philosophia  Ultima.    1905. 

4.  John  Fiske 

Fiske,  John.    Darwinism,  and  Other  Essays.    1885. 

*  Fiske,  John.     Outlines  of  Cosmic  Philosophy.     1902. 

5.   J.  Mark  Baldwin 
Baldwin,  James  Mark.   Mental  Development  in  the  Child 
and  the  Race.    1895. 

*  Baldwin,    James    Mark.     Development    and   Evolution. 

1902. 
Baldwin,   James   Mark.     Fragments   in   Philosophy   and 

Science.    1902. 

•Baldwin,    James   Hark.    Daruin   and   the   Humanities. 

1909. 


366  SELECT    BIBLIOGRAPHY 

VIII.   MODERN  IDEALISM 
1.   The  German  Influences 

*  MuRDOCK,  James.     Sketches  of  Modern  Philosophy,  Es- 
pecially Among  the  Germans.    1842. 

2.   William  T.  Harris 
Harris,  W.  T.   Journal  of  Speculative  Philosophy.    1867- 
1893. 

*  Harris,  W.  T.    Introduction  to  the  Study  of  Philosophy. 
1889. 

Harris,  W.  T.    Exposition  of  Hegel's  Logic.    1895. 

*  Snider,  Denton  J.    A  Writer  of  Books.    1910. 

3.   JosiAH  Royce 

*  Royce,  Josiah.    The  Spirit  of  Modern  Philosophy.    1892. 
Royce,   Josiah.     The   World  and   the  Individual.     1901. 

The  Problem  of  Christianity.     1913. 

4.   George  Trumbull  Ladd 
Ladd,  George  T.    A  Theory  of  Reality.    1899. 

*  Ladd,  George  T.    Knowledge,  Life  and  Reality.    1909. 

IX.   PRAGMATISM 
1.   The  Philosophy  of  Practicality 
Bawden,  H.  H.    The  Principles  of  Pragmatism. 

*  Pratt,  J.  B.     What  is  Pragmatism?    1909. 
Schiller,  F.  C.  S.    Studies  in  Humanism.    1907. 

2.   Charles  Peirce 

*  Peirce,  Charles.    Illustrations  of  the  Logic  of  Science. 
{Popular  Science  Monthly,  1878.) 

3.   John  Dewey 
Dewey,  John.    School  and  Society.    1899. 

*  Dewey,  John.    Studies  in  Logical  Theory.    1903. 


SELECT   BIBLIOGRAPHY  367 

*  Dewey,  John.     The  Influence  of  Darwin  on  Philosophy. 
1910. 

4.   William  James 

*  James,  William.    Pragmatism.    1907. 
James,  William.    A  Pluralistic  Universe.    1909. 
JameS;  William.    The  Meaning  of  Truth.    1910. 

5.   The  Sources  of  Pragmatism 

See  articles  in  the  Journal  of  Philosophy,  Monist,  Philo- 
sophical Review  by 
FuLLERTON,  George. 
Hume,  J.  G. 
LovEJOY,  Arthur  0. 
Miller,  Dickinson  S. 
Montague,  W.  P. 
Riley,  Woodbridge. 
woodbridge,  f.  j.  e. 

6.   The  Critics  of  Pragmatism 

Aliotta,  a.    II  pragmatismo  anglo-americano.    1909. 

*  Bourdeau,  J.     Pragmatisms  et  Modernisme.     1909. 
Flournoy,  H.    La  Philosophic  de  William  James.    1911, 

*  Hebert,  Marcel.     La  Pragm-atisme.     1909. 
Jacoby,  Guenther.     Der  Pragmatismus.    1907. 

Riley,   Woodbridge.     Continental   Critics   of  Pragmatism. 
[Journal  of  Philosophy,  1911.) 
ROYCE,  JosiAH.     William  James  and  Other  Essays.     1911. 
SCHINZ,  A.    Anti-Pragmatisme.    1909. 

X.   THE  NEW  REALISM 

The  New  Realism.     Cooperative  Studies  in  Philosophy. 
1912.     (See  also  current  philosophical  journals.) 


INDEX 


Adams.    John,    76,    82,    83,    84, 

92,    126 
Agassiz,    Louis,    181,    184-191, 

192,  193,  197,  202,  211,  212, 

365 
Agassiz,  Airs.  E.  C,  365 
Alcott,    Bronson,    44,    48,    145, 

249,   251 
Alembert,   d'.   80 
Aliotta,  A..  307 
Allen,  A.  V.  G..  3G2 
Allen,  Ethan,  12-17,  87,  90,  3G2 
Ames,   65 
Amp&re,    332 
Aristotle,    59,     173,    246,    266, 

306,  352,  354 
Armstrong,  238 
Athanasius,    G7 

Bacon,  Lord,  166,  174,  322,  327, 

335 
Baldwin,    J.    Mark,    211,    216- 

228,  305 
Bancroft,    George.    159 
Barclay,  Robert,  41 
Bawden,  H.  H.,  306 
Bearsdley,  E.  E..  302 
Beasley,    Frederick,    112,    135, 

364 
Beattie,   121,  358 
Becelaere,  J.  E.  van,  301 
B^court,  99 

Beissel,  Conrad.  40,  41,  230 
Bellamy,   64,   131 
Bergson,  Henri,   216,  333,  335, 

348,  352.  354.  355 
Berkeley,  George,  19-22,  25,  27, 

28,  63,  66,  113,  120,  121,  123, 

124,   127,   128,   130,  132,   133, 

136.   160,   165,   168,   169,  337 
Berthelot.  334 
Blackmore,  70 
Blondel,  Maurice,  333 


Blount,   12,   102 
Boehme,  Jacob,  42 
Boone,  Daniel,  240,  283 
l?orgeaud,  Charles,  361 
Bourdeau.^332,  335.  336,  367 
Boutmy,  Em  lie.  303 
Boutroux,   Eniile,   334,   335 
Bowen,  Francis,  238 
Boyle,    68 

Bradford.  Ebenezer,  130 
Brissot.    110 
Brockmeycr  240-243 
Brougham,  Henry,  363 
Broussais.   102 
Brown.  Thomas,   119 
Bruneti^re,    Ferdinand,    334 
Bruno,   Giordano     107 
Buchanan,  Joseph,  123,  363 
Buffon,   98 
Bunvan,   John,   312 
Bush,  Wendell  T.,  339 

Cabanis,  80,  98 

Caldwell,  Charles,  93 

Calhoun.   John   C,   182 

Calvin,  4,  11 

Cambrav,   Archbishop,   70 

Carlyle,' Thomas.  120.   159,  170 

Channing.  Edward,  37 

Chastellux.   98 

Chaumoix.   Anilr<5,   334.   335 

Chauncv.   Charles,  57,  58,   166, 

175,  302 
Chiapelli,   Alessandro,   337-339 
Chubb.  88 

Clap.    Thomas.    62.    64 
Clarke.    Samuel.    63,    163 
Cobb.  S.  IL.  302 
Colden.    Cadwullador,    20,    73, 

122.  302 
Coleridge.    144.    160.    Ifil.    164. 

100,   109.    170,   ISO,  230,  237 
Collier,    101 


869 


370 


INDEX 


Collins,    88 

Collins,   Lansing,    129 

Comte,  Auguste,  172,  246,  325, 

326,   328,   329 
Condillac,   98 
Condorcet,  70,  98 
Cooper,    Thomas,    94,    102-104, 

122,  123 
Cope,  Edward,  208-211,  216,  365 
Copernicus,    234 
Cousin,  237,  242,  243,  246 
Crashaw,    167 
Cr6vec(Eur,  98 
Cudworth,    47,    113,    161,    163, 

167 
Curtis,  G.  T.,  207 
Curtis,  M.  M.,  361 
Cuvier,   184,  189,  202 

Dabney,  R.  L.,  363 

Dana,  James,  93 

Dana,  James  Dwight,  191,  196- 
201,  204,  215,  365 

Darwin,  Charles,  77,  183,  185, 
187,  188-190,  192,  194,  196, 
198,  199,  201,  202,  204,  205, 
207-211,  214,  215,  218,  220, 
224-228,  304,  305,  307,  322, 
340 

Darwin,  Erasmus,  77,  96,  113, 
124 

Dawson,  207 

Descartes,  19,  66,  102,  274, 
333,   335 

Dewey,  John,  280,  282-284, 
288,  289-308,  318,  321,  323, 
324,  330,  331,  366,  367 

Dexter,  F.  B.,  362 

Dick,  92 

Diderot,  80 

Dobson,  Thomas,   176 

Donne,    167 

Driesch,    352 

Du  Pont  de  Nemours,  98 

Durant,  116 

Dwight,  Timothy,  17,  90,  91, 
99,    122 


Eddy,  Mary  Baker,  44,  47,  48, 
49 


Edison,  332 

Edwards,  Jonathan,  7,  8,  28-35, 
37,  40,  47,  113,  116,  130, 
173,    252,    257 

Ellis,  G.  E.,  361 

Emerson,  R.  W.,  6,  18,  43, 
46-49,  58,  61,  62,  95,  102, 
117,  140-154,  154-171,  173, 
175,  230,  237,  249,  251,  252, 
276,  300,  304,  329,  336,  337, 
364 

Epicurus,   59,   61,   97,   98 

Everett,    Edward,    159,    162 

Faraday,   167 

Faust,  245 

Fechner,  329,  338 

F^nelon,  41 

Fichte,  159,  163,  229,  231,  237, 

239,    247,    254,    328 
Fiske,  John,  211-216,  365 
Flournoy,  H.,  367 
Foley,  J.  P.,  363 
Ford,  P.  L.,  363 
Foster,  F.  H.,  361 
Francke,  Kuno,  230 
Franklin,     Benjamin,     12,     26, 

42,  47,  52,  55,  66,  68-77,  80, 

87,  94,  97,  101,  114,  115,  176, 

208,  252,  363 
Freneau,  91 
Fresnel,  332 
Friedenwald,  H.,  361 
Frothingham,    O.    B.,    48,    238, 

364 
Fuller,  Margaret,  50 
Fullerton,  George,  367 

Galileo,  345 

Gardiner,  H.  N.,  362 

Genet,    91 

Gilman,  D.  C,  365 

Goadard,  H.  C,  364 

Goethe,  159,  170,  202,  211,  229, 

234 
Gray,  Asa,  170,  183,  188,  189, 

191-194,    196,    200,   215,   305, 

307,  365 
Green,    Ashbel,    125,    127 
Grimes,    116 


INDEX 


371 


Grimm,   80 

Guyot,  Arnold,  173,  202,  204 

Haldeman,    182 

Hamilton.    Sir    William,    118, 

119,    121,   246 
Harris,  W.  T.,  240-253,  364,  366 
Hartley,   112,   124 
Hartmann.   von,  247 
Hubert,  Marcel,   332,   335,   339, 

367 
Hecker,  230 

Hegel,    159,   237,   239,   241-248, 
263.  323,   324,   328,   333,  343 
Helv4tius,  80,  97 
Henry,  196 
Henry,  Joseph,   135 
Henry,  Patrick,  86 
Heracleitus,    136,    304,    321 
Herbert,  George,  160,  165,  167, 

168 
Herbert,  Lord,  69 
Herschel,    167 
Hicks,  Elias,  39 
Hitchcock,  173,  177,  178,  364 
Hobbes,  90,  112,  113,  114,  120, 

156 
Holbach,   d',   80 
Holyoke,  Edward,  59 
Homer,   159 
Houston,  George,  88 
Hudson,    117 

Hume,    61,    63,    90,    118,    120, 
123,  124,   130,  156,  163,  302, 
322,   327 
Hume,  J.  G.,  367 
Hunter,    167 
Hutcheson,    78 
Hutchinson,   Anne,   37 
Huxley,  200 
Hyatt,  210 

Jacobi.  Guenther,  367 

James,  Henry,   Sr.,   329 

James,    William,    33,    50.    117, 

161    247,  253,  258,  270,  271, 

280-283.   288.   296.   299,   301. 

303,    320,    322-333,    336-338, 

Jefferson,  Thomas.  11,  47,  66. 
77-85,  87,  97-102,  116,  122, 
363 


Johnson,  Samuel,  19-28,  66,  68, 

130,  277.  362 
Jones,  A.  L.,  361 

Kames,    Lord,    78 

Kant,  93,  123,  137,  156.  159, 
161-163,  170,  229,  231-238, 
243  247,  253.  323,  327,  332, 
335!   342,   343,   345,   352 

Knott,   182 

Knox,  John,  120 

Koerner,   230 

Krauth,  239 

Ladd,  G.  T.,  253,  265-278,  368 

Lafayette,  98,  99 

Lamarck.    104,    107,    179.    191, 

193,    199,   211,  217,   218 
Lange,  232,  233 
Laplace,   167 
Lavoisier,    98 

Le  Conte,  Joseph,  191,  365 
Lee,  Anne.  44 

Leibniz,  166,  171,  183,  290,  335 
Leidy,    Joseph,    109,    182 
Lewis,  Taylor,    173 
Lincoln,  Abraham,  89 
Linnseus,    176 

Livingstone,  William,  4,  66 
Locke,   John.   5,    M,    124.    133, 

156,  163,   169,  235,  322 
Lotze,   342 

Lovejoy,  Arthur,  161,  367 
Loyala,  Ignatius  de,  336 
Lyell,    167 

Macaulay,  309 

McCosh.  James,  118,  123,  201- 

207,  237,  304,  365 
McGiffert,  Arthur,  323 
Madison,   86 
Maeterlinck,   50 
Marbois.  de,  76 
Marsh,   170,  200 
Martineau,  Harriet.  94 
Martineau.  James,  363 
Marvin,   345 
Mather.  Cotton,   8.   11.   55,  57, 

62,    150,    166,    173,    175,   362, 

363 
Mather,  Increase,  37 


372 


INDEX 


Meade,  Bishop,  93 

Merriam,  C.  E.,  361 

Mesmer,  48,  52,  114-116 

Micholet,   247 

Mill,  John  Stuart,  246,  322 

Miller,  Dickinson,  327,  367 

Miller,  Hugh,   177 

Miller,   Samuel,   118,    133,    134, 

221,  222,  364 
Milton,  73 

Montague,  W.  P.,  348,  367 
More,  47,   161 
Morgan,  88 
Morse,    332 

Morton,  Samuel,  180-182,  197 
Miinsterberg,  Hugo,  356 
Murdock,  James,  170,  230,  235, 

366 

Napoleon,  205 

Newton,  Sir  Isaac,  14,  65,  66, 

99,   167,  224 
Nietzsche,  328 
Nisbet,   Charles,   136 
Norris,  Charles,  47,  113,  161 
Norton,    Andrews,    237 
Novalis,  254 

Odell,  Jonathan,  126 
Oken,   185,   186 
Ormond,  Alexander,  205 
Owen,   167 

Packard,  210 

Paine,   Thomas,   4,  55,   66,  74, 

76,  84,  86-95,  363 
Paley,  195 
Palmer,  Elihu,  89 
Papini,  320 
Parmenides,  240 
Pascal,  29 
Peirce,   Charles,   247,  253,  280- 

284,  288,  289,  298,  307,  317, 

330,  331,  333,  337,  366 
Penn,  William,  38,  40,  42,  212, 

362 
Periam,  Joseph,   130-132 
Perry,    R.    B.,    345 
Pitkin,  352,  354,  368 
Plato,    59,    73,    113,    146,    155, 

161-164,    166,    169,    183,   202, 


212,  250,  264,  304,  317,  318, 

331,   336 
Plutarch,  163 

Poincar§,  Henri,  268,  326,  334 
Pope,  Alexander,  11 
Porter,  Noah,  239,  362 
Poyen,  Charles,   115 
Pratt,  J.  B.,  366 
Prichard,   181 
Priestley,    Joseph,    73,    78,    97, 

98,   100-108,   113,   122,   123 
Protagoras,   304,   321,   331 
Prout,   92 

Quarles,  160 
Quesnay,  98 
Quimby,   44,   48 

Rankin,  H.  W.,  365 

Ranch,  234 

Ray,  70 

Reid,    Thomas,    118,    119,    121, 

127,  129,   137,   169,  358 
Renan,   248,   326 
Rey,  Abel,  325,  333,  335 
Riley,    Woodbridge,     361,    362, 

367 
Ripley,  Ezra,  93,  237 
Rochefoucauld,  98 
Romaine,  64 
Royce,    Josiah,    211,    247,   253- 

265,  270,  276,  277,  304,  356, 

366,  367 
Rush,    Benjamin,    82,    104-117, 

122,  127,  135,  363 

Sacheverel,  5 
Sanborn,  F.  B.,  364 
Santayana,  George,  361 
Schelling,    159,    171,    185,    186, 

231,   237,   239,  246,  259,  333 
Scherger,  G.  L.,  362 
Schiller,  229 

Schiller,  F.  C.  S.,  321,  331,  366 
Schinz,  A.,  367 
Schmucker,  234 
Shaftesbury,  Lord,  63 
Shields,    Charles    W.,    206-207, 

365 
Smith,   Samuel   Stanhope,   130- 

133,  178,  180,  364 


INDEX 


373 


Smith,  William,  26,  77 

Snider,  D.  J.,  240,  243.  305 

Socrates,   73,    140,   24S 

Solon,    70 

Sophocles,    70 

Sparks,  Jared,   12,   17 

Spinoza,    02.    140 

Sterrett,  J.   M..   245 

Stewart,   Dugald,  92,    119,    121 

St.   Hilaire,   202 

Stiles,    Ezra,    62-65,    73,     120, 

129 
Swedenborg,  100,  329,  330,  338 

Taine,    326,   333 

Taylor,  Thomas,   166 

Tonncman,    170 

Thoroau,    149,    240 

Ticknor,  George,  159,   102,  231 

Tindal,   88 

Tocqueville,  98,  363 

Tompkins,   II.   B.,  303 

Turgot,  98 

Tjier,  M.  C,  301 

Uhden,  F.  11..  301 
Upham,  43 

Valdes,    Juan   do,    41 
Vandyke,  Joseph,  207 
Vaughan,    106,    167 
Vico,    190 


N'olnev,   89,   98 

Voltaire,  70,  77,  89-91,  119 

Walker,  Williston.  301 
Washington,   17,   125 
Watts.   77 
Webster,    Noah.    90 
Wells.  W.  C,   ISO,   182 
Wendell.  Barrett.  301 
Whitotield,  04 
Whitman.   Walt.  318 
Wliittier,   J.   CJ..   42 
Willard,   Samuel,    10 
Williams,    Roger,    37 
Willoughby,  W.  W.,  361 
Witherspoon,      John,      125-133, 

304 
Woltr.  159 
\Nollaston,   69,   73 
Woodbridge,      Frederick,      341, 

307 
Woodrow,  207 

Woolman,  John.  38,  40,  42,  302 
Woolston,    88 
Wordsworth.   144.    104 
Wright,  Fanny,  88 

Xenophanes,    107 

Zeno.    356 
Zinzendorf,  43 
Zoroaster,   140 


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